


Atrophying Scruples

by axoplasmic



Category: One Piece
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-04-02
Updated: 2017-11-13
Packaged: 2018-03-20 22:20:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 26,772
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3667353
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/axoplasmic/pseuds/axoplasmic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dirty deeds are the path to a fulfilling life; it's better to watch the world burn at your feet than to burn with it. Sometimes the wish for (another) death gets to be a bit too strong. SI/OC-centric</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue: Where the hell am I?

**Author's Note:**

> What do you get when you drop a dead guy into the world of OP? Nothing good. Just a story of a guy trying to keep himself sane when the world around him is from a Japanese comic book. Yes, I have hopped on the SI bandwagon. My very first fic, too! I really had character development in mind when I wrote this so don't shoot me. Rated for language, drug mentions, and mild imagery.

_"He who fights monsters should see to it that he himself does not become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you."_

_—_ **Friedrich Nietzsche** _, Beyond Good and Evil_

* * *

For me, death was quick. A fucking imbecile who thought a gun was going to solve all the world’s problems had decided my fate. The blackness that followed didn’t surprise me; in fact, I was expecting it. I’d never believed in an afterlife, heaven, hell, purgatory, what-have-you. It was of my firmest beliefs that once you die, you’re dead. Really, the word itself is emphatic. **_Death_**. Written right there on the tin. 

What I hadn’t expected was that I would be conscious after my death. That sounds weird when I say it. I was aware of myself... as some disembodied essence of who I was. I knew that I was dead; however, I was in a plane of sheer nonexistence. I had no limbs, no voice, nothing. I’d  _ingeniously_  christened that place “The Void.”

My time in The Void was inestimable; I could’ve been there for a few hours, I could’ve been there for a few weeks. After playing the game of “How Long Will It Take Me to Go Fucking Nuts” and losing at the 307,710th second, I stopped trying to figure it out. Who was to say my time in The Void could be measured by earthly standards, anyway? For all I knew, it was an interspatial dimension where what felt like one second could’ve been one century – or vice versa. To me, it felt like years, stuck with only my thoughts as company. I couldn’t sleep— _there was no_   _sleep_ , just me. It was excruciating.

I’d mulled over the possibility of being in hell. The ubiquitous darkness mocked me, offering no response to my questions. _Where am I? What’s going on? How long have I been here? When will you tell me anything? Damn it, why can’t get an answer?_ It was dreadfully hellish. More time seemed to pass and I was left alone to think: about my life, my death, all my wrongdoings, and how I could’ve ended up in The Void.

It didn’t really add up.

If having memories in The Void was a trial of hell, it wasn’t a good one. I was just your everyday dude; I was an only child and I grew up in American suburbia. My parents were  _pleasant_ , in the sense that they made sure to buy me a suit— _make me look good, make them look good_—when we had neighbors over. Sure, I wasn’t a saint; my sins were the basic ones. I had my rebellious stage as a teen, left the nest right after. I might’ve conned a few people in my early college years, had sex before marriage, smoked cigs for about two years, and partook of psilocybin (as well as a variety of other narcotics) every now and again.

Nothing  _too_  bad.

Hell, I was even working on getting my medical degree. I wanted to be a neurologist, treating the PNS and all that. I was the guy people knew to ask where to buy some cheap weed and crack a snide joke. I showed up to class most days, of course, but I wasn’t an exemplary student. Neither my professors nor my contemporaries would have anything especially good to say about me, as well they shouldn’t. None of them knew me. I kept to myself. Not a damn person would’ve cared if I died.

When it finally hit me, I’d have laughed if I had the means to.  _Is that why I’m here? I think this punishment is a little over the top, don’t you?_   _You could’ve explained that to me, you know. Told me what was up. Instead, you stick me in a black hole and expect me to figure it out,_ basking _in the ambiance of where my sin brought me._   _Super._ I don’t know whom I was talking to—God or whoever handles that shit.

I can't tell you when it happened but after an insurmountable stretch of time, I was ejected from The Void. After being incorporeal for so long, I couldn’t fathom being compressed, and turned, and pushed out of the negative space I’d become so... _accustomed_   _to_  for so long. The process was sick and brutal. It was a paroxysm of sensation; suddenly I was breathing, it was bright, cold,  _I was breathing_. The panic set in instantaneously.

_What happened? Now where am I? What’s going on?_

Everything was an amorphous mix of severe brightness and not. I heard noise, voices, except I  _wasn’t_  hearing them. The sounds were dulled, as if I was underwater; what I did hear, I couldn’t understand. Had The Void made me deaf? Verbal agnosia? The only discernable things were the giant shadows moving around, which served to peak my fear.

It was fucking terrifying.

In that situation, I did what any frustrated man who had been inhumanly numb for God knows how long and was abruptly subjected to harsh sensation, limited vision, near deafness, and utter confusion would have done.

I bawled.

It was an undignified cry, holding all of the pent up frustration—confusion—disappointment— **anguish** that I couldn’t express when I was stuck in The Void. _This isn’t what death is supposed to be. I’m not supposed to be here. It’s supposed to different. I’m not supposed to know anything. The Void shouldn’t even exist. I died; why am I not dead?_ I screamed.  _Howled_.

I felt something touching me, holding me. Surely it was the time of my reckoning. I had figured out the puzzle of The Void and now my judgment was to be passed. At least it was warmer. I was still fucking wailing; at that point, even when I tried, I couldn’t stop. (Looking back, I realized that my new body’s instincts had taken hold of the metaphorical wheel and wouldn’t let me shut up. I passed out after exhausting my lungs, anyway.)

* * *

Early life was confusing. I could never figure out why my world was a blur of colors one moment and black the next. In a state of constant sleepiness, my limbs refusing to listen to me, I was upset and perpetually afraid (and I admit I woke up screaming once or twice... Or several times. Who knows. Who  _cares_?). It was—damn it, I  _knew_  that I was cognizant and I could see – I remember the blended pinks, blues, and greens of the world – yet I couldn’t  _see_  and I didn’t know what was going on. I was trapped? Something like that but not  _quite_. Stripped of my dignity, I should say. The feeling is hard to explain.

Moreover, infancy is a time that I still try to bury in the recesses of my mind.

By the time about five months had passed, I’d figured out that I was reincarnated. I’m still getting used to it, to be honest. At times I think that the bullet missed my vital spots and I slipped into a coma, all of this shit an illusion my fucked up mind concocted. The notion is laughable, but it gives me a weird sense of solace.

Maybe I’m on an extremely long trip from acid I don’t remember taking. The bullshit that goes on around here is enough for me to believe it. Why else would I have memories of my “other” life? The alternative gives me a headache when I think about it. I don’t know. I don’t know a damn thing anymore. It certainly feels real enough.

Originally, I thought that I was in hell; no control of my motor functions, trippy sight, helpless. It was a form of hell in its own right. The fact that a giant creature would lift me up and make weird noises at me made it that much worse. However, the noises vaguely resembled sounds meant to pacify, which left me to ponder over things for a while (when I wasn’t wallowing in frustration or sleeping... or both. Dreams can do so many things to the isolated mind).

Once my eyesight had started (re)developing, I recognized that I was inside of a jail-like thing. It was a crib. I thought it was another trial of hell, telling me that humans were only infants and deserved to reside as such. I was drained from my existential contemplations about what hell truly was (Sartre’s ideology of the realm being built around others was horrifyingly captivating. It was disappointing that I had to spend eternity as a damned  _baby_ ). I’d even entertained the probability that the situation was tailored to me specifically (for a person of my pride, that form of hell is atrociously perfect; take everything away and leave me a shell of the individual I used to be. Not much else is worse). After exhausting myself from thinking too much, I fell asleep.

When I awoke, I was in another creature’s arms. Fear is a crippling thing when there are arms from a being  _seven times your size_  wrapped around you. Of course, I was over the screaming after the first couple of months; fuck if it stopped me from trembling. That only served to freak the guy out (that was the first time one of them had picked me up since my sight improved, so I finally got a good look at him) and make him sing to me off-key while rocking me to his abnormal tempo.

His performance was  _horrible_ , and the way his voice cracked from time to time made it even worse to bear. Eventually I calmed down and managed a half smile at his shitty attempt; he seemed relieved at that and sat back down. Sight made things so much easier for me to handle and we spent a few moments staring at each other. I’d briefly wondered if that was Satan and then promptly hurled the thought out of the window. It was ridiculous that Lucifer would sing to the damned, even if he weren’t speaking English.

He was nothing special; thick eyebrows, deep-set gray eyes, hooked nose, black hair. If that  _were_  Satan, he’d have to work on his scare tactics. In any event, the man had this loving expression on his face, as if he just gave birth to me. It was mildly disturbing. When I furthered my examination, I saw that he couldn’t have been any older than twelve; still-there-but-slimming baby fat clung to his cheeks and I spotted the beginnings of acne. The “man” was no more than a boy.

With that revelation, I was sure that I wasn’t in hell. I had died, I was then an infant, and there was a child coddling me. The moment he pressed his forehead to mine, I came to the reluctant conclusion that I had been reincarnated.

Taking that into account, I couldn’t help but fall back into my original assumption. Yeah, I wasn’t in Dante’s Inferno; nevertheless, I’d made my peace the first fucking time around. To do it again? Oh, perhaps I  _had_  ended up in hell. The hell of being human, sculpting a life that could fall apart at any moment from unforeseen happenstances. There were memories I shouldn’t have and trying to live out a “new” life with predisposed cynicism and a slight drug... craving (because I was  _never_ addicted, I’ll tell you that right now) was appalling. The idea of repeating  **everything** , in my own body or not, had my stomach rolling.

My tiny body was very receptive to my emotions and I wound up puking on the little kid. I commended his will, taking everything with only a little scrunch to his nose. I passed out again.

The next time I woke up (it’s hard for me to say how  _harrowing_  the whole passing out thing was – I refuse to call it falling asleep, since it was less of a refreshing experience and more of an unwilling and interruptive one) I was back in my crib. I was also unhappy. Well, I was unhappy since I was in The Void; it wasn’t quite as frustratingly potent as it was when I realized I wasn’t in hell.

I wasn’t sitting in a cage, incapable of doing jack shit. I was sitting in a cage, incapable of doing jack shit with people  _taking care of me_. It was different from when I thought I was damned; I could’ve wasted away with perpetual ennui, not had a person who I didn’t know doing everything for me until I gained full control of my speech and motor functions. Utter helplessness was fucking maddening.

The whole situation made me spiteful. I refused to call attention to myself when I was hungry (luckily, breastfeeding was never attempted) and gave no effort to cooperate with my “family.” I never smiled when they made silly faces, I purposely screamed when they tried to touch me, and I constantly threw tantrums. I figured if I was unresponsive to outside stimuli and unnaturally persnickety, they’d think something was wrong with me and drown me or whatever.

I was an annoying little fucker.

Truthfully, I was hoping that I contracted SIDS while I was young. Being a cosmic anomaly and whatnot should’ve made me more susceptible to that type of thing, right? If not, then the tumultuous nature of my attitude would make my family avoid me and I’d die from lack of physical stimulation;  _that_  much I knew was true.

Unfortunately, nothing of the sort happened, and my female primary caretaker (I’ve always been loath to say mother) eventually brought me to a doctor. The quack had the gall to say that  _situations like this are completely normal_  and all I needed was  _some time to adjust_  because _certain children can be a bit finicky_.

If I wasn’t being a brat, I was in my crib stuck with my frenemy, boredom. The bastard was around so often, I couldn’t help getting used to him. Let’s not forget our bonding time in The Void as well as in my previous life. He’s the type of guy to grow on you, you know? He’s still a total pain to deal with.

My bad behavior did nothing to deter the kid who I’d vomited on, though. A little while after the doctor’s visit, he’d started coming into my little room every day without fail. I was a volatile and bitter soul at that point in time; it didn’t help the guy when I gained enough control of my limbs to pick things up and chuck them at his head when he sat in front of me, trying to play peek-a-boo.

Soon enough, I learned that the kid’s name was Parker, and he was my older brother. (I had three other siblings as well; my capricious displays kept them away for a long while and I only started interacting with them after I’d begun learning how to walk.) I spent almost all of my time with Parker. The kid fed me, taught me things, played with me, changed me (I will never talk about this again, as it’s horrifying and life shattering), and was pretty much my surrogate mother. My “actual” one didn’t want to deal with the stress of trying to handle me, so all of my trust and love went to Parker.

Surprisingly, he still tried teaching me things, not at all on board with the idea of me being mentally handicapped. A few of the books he shoved in my face contained what I’d recognized to be kanji, making my first assumption that the people were speaking Chinese. In fact, it wasn’t until I learned how to say ‘butterfly’ at eight months old that I figured out it was  _Japanese_. (Why butterfly? Blame my parents’ desire for me to be as “cultured”— _stuffed shirted_ —as possible, shoving shit like Puccini’s _Madama Butterfly_  down my throat. I spoke fluent Italian but  _no_ , I had to be thrown in a Japanese speaking world.)

The oral aspect of it was easier than the written; not to say it wasn’t hard to learn. My pliable child brain made learning much easier, but the fact that one word could mean five things depending on the way it’s written and the context it’s used in is ridiculous. Let’s not forget slang, dialects, and the odd verbal tics everyone seems to have.

* * *

By the time I was two, I was walking and had already acquiesced to the reality that I had to live out this life. Ergo, I’d dropped the whiny brat act and was much mellower. The change seemed all too suspicious to my...  _family_  and they had questioned Parker on whether he’d beaten me or not. His horrified shock was as strong as the wry kick I got out of it.

It was also when people started noticing how “prodigious” I was. While I didn’t learn the language as quickly as I wanted to, my progress was still fast in terms of child learning. Beyond that, my other skills were exemplary for my age. Only my eldest sister picked up that my intelligence was unnatural.

The most important thing I learned upon reaching two, however, was the knowledge of my birthplace.

Parker and the others had deemed me a normal enough child to bring me out in public around then. Therefore, when he set out to get some meat one day, there was no argument as I toddled after him in the overalls he’d dressed me up in that morning. Even better, he offered me a piggyback ride (probably more in necessity than affection), to which I happily obliged (probably more in laziness than cooperation).

As we walked out of the house and to whatever square from which Parker had intended to get our food, I felt the oddest sense of déjà vu and wonder. The ground was all plush-looking grass, the kind you see in those crazy movies about faeries and forest spirits. The kind that’s practically extinct due to industrialization. My head swam as opalescent bubbles— _so pretty, so familiar, so_ —ascended from the ground itself all around us and I spotted gigantic trees with two tones of green due to vertical striping.

They seemed to be everywhere, with roots conglomerated around each one like bunched up string, dilapidated buildings out of place sitting upon them. My grip on Parker’s shoulders tightened as it got harder to breathe, each bubble popping louder and louder and— _nasty human auction houses with mermaids and nobles and_ —that tree was almost like— _a giant_ — ** _mangrove_**.

As a bout of vertigo washed over me, my brother jostled me a little and took me off his back. I threw up and blacked out. (I did quite a bit of that back then, didn’t I?)

I can't truly say if the world I was reborn into is better or worse than America, the land of the frivolous and the home of the boneheads. It was definitely more dangerous, what with humongous sea monsters and pirates. Despite that, there was also an atmosphere of greatness to this world. I got the shit end of the stick landing on Sabaody, where Celestial Dragons and slave traders lurk, but there wasn’t the stagnant loom of expectation anywhere. That fact alone made the air a little easier to inhale, even if it reeked with stench of shit I didn’t want to deal with.


	2. Meet the Florences

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's July and I'm a gigantic shitlord excuse of an author. I got kudos, though? Wow this is very amazing. I'm very sorry.

I find my situation kind of unfair.

Here, a person doesn’t need to have a degree, a white-collar job, or a Porsche to feel important. No one is vilified for doing they want _since that’s how this entire world operates_. Chasing some crazy dream is the closest to “typical” this place has. 

Every village wages the chance of being razed by pirates, which is shitty, but the majority of the areas in the four blue seas (and a few on the Grand Line) are relatively peaceful; as safe as any big city, really. The death rate caused by pirates here is equivalent to the death rate caused by car accidents back in Normal Land (referring to the place I remember as “my past life” rubs me the wrong way). All things considered, One Piece isn’t the worst world to be reborn into.

And Sabaody? Sabaody Archipelago is filled with wonders. Sabaody Park is the place every kid wants to visit, a perfect blend of colorful rides and alluring adrenaline. Many groves hold souvenir shops, offering all sorts of trinkets tickling anyone’s trivial fancy. The state of the mangroves are beautiful; natural pearly bubbles and grass only existent in Dr. Seuss books tempting anyone who visits to sit down and enjoy the scent of dew. 

Unless you’re born on Grove 16 of Sabaody Archipelago in the middle of the motherfucking lawless zone.

Celestial Dragons roam whenever they please, forcing the citizens to live in constant paranoia of death. The lawless zones constitute for a third of the area, slave trade and black market businesses everywhere. Even worse, corrupt Marines are almost as bad as the nobles, making shady transactions and neglecting their authority. On Sabaody, a simple glance at the wrong person can get you six feet under, be it the crooked Marines, the trigger-happy Celestial Dragons, or the pirates who think they’re hot shit just because they made it through Paradise. The danger is only amplified when you live in the lawless area.

Actually _registering_ I was on Sabaody would really twist my fucking boxers. 

As a young kid, I wasn’t out in bars and associating with the type of people who were going to kill me, so I didn’t have to worry about that for years. Until the day I puked up the mucous stomach fluids of a breakfast-less morning onto Parker’s nicest pair of shoes, I was only a man-child in Japan; confused as fuck and more than a little bit irritable.  
I merely wanted to absorb as much as possible. Walking, talking, and (unexpectedly?) Japanese folklore. Without Parker, my childhood would’ve been in shambles.

* * *

Nine months was quite an important landmark, when I think back on it. I’d mastered walking, I’d begun absorbing pivotal communicative information, and I could take care of my bathroom necessities. The culmination of my basic goals. 

The whole “potty trained” thing may not give the impression of importance. I assure you, it is. Even before learning how to hold a proper conversation, I’d sought to master making my way to the toilet by my damn self. On my journey to self-sufficiency, not only had I rid myself of the ignominy that came with diaper changes; I had also come across a problem. 

The first time I waddled over to the bathroom door, Parker came up behind me encouraged me to do my business (the little jerk was undoubtedly overjoyed that he didn’t need to take care of my diapers anymore). Upon pulling down my pants, I discovered something petrifying.

_My penis was not there._

I had lived twenty fucking years in Normal Land with my package and one day (after **trudging** through nine months of infant development, barely grasping at communication, and fighting against my body’s reaction to piss, shit, puke, and sleep whenever the fuck it wanted to) I saw that _my dick was gone_. 

There were no signs. 

Parker didn’t put me in little dresses and call me cute; he’d play wrestle with me and compliment my aim when I threw stuffed animals at his head. I thought I’d been reassembled with all of my damn parts and unquestionably _not female_. It was one of the most psychologically scarring experiences of this life. 

So scarring, actually, that I broke down and cried right there in the bathroom (screwing up my six-month streak of no tears). Unsurprisingly, Parker burst in thinking I’d fallen into the toilet; instead, he found me slumped over myself and sobbing grossly into my chubby little hands. 

It was one of the larger slaps-to-the-face of this new life. I had been reborn into One Piece; that was surreal. Mind blowing. But still something I could deal with, even on a frustrated and emotionally suppressed level. Finding out I wasn’t a man, wasn’t _myself_ on such a basic level as sexual identity was… painful. I would always be me— _and who am I really, if not a man in his prime with years of experience and life and normalcy behind him now all fucked because dying should have been_ — **of course** I would always be me, but after that I knew something would be missing. Something _visceral_ that bit at me incessantly – 

_wrongwrongwrong fix it please fix it_

– and wouldn’t let up.

For the next few months, the world was agonizingly loud.

My head was filled with clamor, like a TV in the other room blasting commercials all damn day. The thrum of noise was relentless, unintelligible chatter that only abated when I slept. At night it was slightly less demanding, calming to subtle murmurs at the back of my thoughts, yet still enough to bother me.

I supposed that I was going insane from the whole _dying_ thing and my voices were late to the party, unhelpful coping mechanisms I built in order to guard myself from the loneliness of landing fuck knows where in some infant’s body. It was also more evidence that I was pretty screwed up if my mind’s idea of comfort was meaningless babble.

When I tried, I could stifle the racket in my head to a tolerable minimum, but it was never completely gone. Sometimes I tried to spark up a conversation with the voices, to no avail. All I got was the endless static of indiscernible speech. 

Every once in a while, some of the voices would disappear, which was a relief, yet it left me with a sense of disquiet. Each voice that left my head was like a countdown to when I would ultimately snap; if my fucked up little world went silent, I would be alone. Again. I’d have nothing except wearisome thoughts about a life far away from this one, and all the things that should’ve been. Those voices were vexing. 

Having them ripped away from me was even more so.

* * *

If there was one thing I wanted, above all else, it was to know how to read.

Back in Normal Land, I used to devour books. Vonnegut, Hesse, Nietzsche, Hubbard, Thoreau, Freud. I discovered philosophical literature when I was thirteen and never looked back. They were amazing men, their words showing the very essence of my understanding of the world I lived in. I soared from chapter to chapter, dismissing various ideas and adopting others. Beyond that, every book I touched became part of my mental arsenal. Newspaper articles, textbooks, comic books, fiction novels, and everything in between. I was a sponge and my brain would drink up every word I saw. It wasn’t so much a want as a _need_.

Learning something new is incredible. It’s a gateway for curiosity to poke its nose out. Where does this new information lead? How does it relate to other subjects? An inherent need to know more leads to research. There’s too much—there’s _too much knowledge_ and it’s intense. Overwhelming. Crushing.

Understanding is similar to a drug; one can never get enough of the shit. It’s addictive. 

It’s the type of drug that can reduce even the most distinguished of men to nothing more than junkies, clearing portions of their arrogant minds in the face of the eternity of the universe and the ignorance that is humankind.

The need, the craving, the ardor— _they don’t leave_. Even in the face of such vastness, such unreachable depths of comprehension. Enough to know for an entire lifetime and there’s only _more_. Anyone with half a brain will want it all. More and more, so much that a person can’t even keep up with all that they’ve archived, and _it’s insufficient_. They’ll amass papers and hoard facts and absorb statistics and still be unsatisfied. Empty. 

They’ll scan shelves and delve into shit that isn’t even interesting for the sake of knowing; knowing those things _makes_ them interesting. But death will come before even a fraction of a fraction of what’s out there can settle into a person’s mind. And it’s so frustrating, so humbling, so cruel that simply wanting to know _what’s available to know_ becomes the goal. We’ll die ignorant, but pursuing that knowledge lets us die with dignity in a state of existence that was doomed from the beginning. 

I hate _knowing_ , as much as I know I couldn’t live without it.

I was very lucky that Parker was a decently educated kid, able to help me associate the sounds with the words as he read them off to me by pausing to point them out. Luckier was that he was hell-bent on my academic success, shoving books in my face to the waning of my temper.

Japanese and English aren’t that similar. English is simple, an alphabet; there are twenty-six letters, each representing a different phoneme. Certain letter combinations make a new sound or place emphasis on another letter. 

Hiragana and katakana are syllabaries; each symbol stands for a joint consonant-vowel sound, with the exception of the characters for each vowel and the letter ‘n’ (don’t even fucking ask), and combining certain sounds makes a word. Katakana only differs from hiragana because it’s used for non-traditional words: foreign words, binomial nomenclature, company names, onomatopoeia, blah blah _blah_. 

Kanji throws all conventions on the ground and shits on them. 

Whereas each kana symbol is a sound, each kanji symbol is an entire word. There are _tens_ of _thousands_. With the slightest change in context, kanji can adopt a new pronunciation, a new meaning, and different kanji can sound the same. Speech is also fluid here, considering everyone’s unique spin on the way they speak – from the area they were raised to their fucking mood. 

It wasn’t often that I was appreciative of my new body, but the unwrinkled brain I had was really working wonders for me. Sure, I’d been one of the nerds in Normal Land; on the other hand, learning a language never came to me this easily. (In my adventures of Italian, it took me seventeen months to identify the gender of a word on instinct.)   
That brought up the headache-inducing impossibility of a still developing brain’s ability to retain the awareness of a past life. 

The brain creates the sense of “self,” or what some would call _the soul_ , through chemical reactions. Synapses, axons, and neurons work together to process outer stimuli for future use and, in turn, create embossments in the brain. Energy relations make a body, just shifting electrical potentials, along with thermal and biochemical reactions.

The brain links with the mind, obviously, but does the mind _really_ coalesce with the brain? Could mental experience, feelings, conation, and thoughts correlate with a physiological entity, or even have _any_ relation to electrical potential, heat, and chemistry? The brain I was using was obviously new, with what I could readily retain and implement. What did that say about “self”? 

Neuropsychology had never been my favorite thing back in Normal Land; it leaves such a bitter taste in my mouth when I think about it.

* * *

Getting a _good_ grasp on reading took about ten months; it felt as if I finally had a shred of control in this life. I’d shifted back into the man with too much time on his hands and a voracious appetite for information. I had to start with children’s books (hilariously coming upon a battered copy of _Liar Noland_ and keeping it with the rest of my “childhood” sentiments), though I didn’t mind much. 

I was used to Cinderella, Goldilocks, and an informative Aesop. Japan took a different spin on fairy tales. Many were parables; others were plain disturbing. _Kachi Kachi Yama_ had to be one of the most amusingly twisted ones I’d ever read. Plus, all the weird ass mythical creatures! There were tales of mermaids, dragons, and vampires, yeah; there were also long nosed bird people, red creatures that existed for the sole reason of licking up unclean bathroom dirt, and flying cotton strips that attacked people and smothered them to death. I loved early Japan’s wacky legends.

Storybooks became less testing and I moved on to more difficult books. I wanted to know whatever I could. As far as I’d been aware, I was in Japan; when was I? Feudal era or Heian era? Was I a Harajuku kid, or had I landed somewhere in the Kyoto prefecture? All the speculation made me weary.

It was also around that time that I met my family outside of Parker.

Parker scooped me out of my wooden prison with an unnaturally wide smile on his face and headed to the door. Since I hadn’t requested that, I figured the kid was going to pull something. 

He liked to spring random shit on me, but he meant well, if nothing else. Though, the last time that happened, the brat fucked up my finger by trying to clip my nails. ‘Oh, you’re so tough, Kumo! Barely crying!’ Lying little bastard. All I have to say is that a toddler’s pain tolerance is fucking terrible.

I was perched on his hip, bunching his shirt up in my sausage-like fingers for balance, and clenched my fists at the sight at the end of the hall. Four women all sat around a table. The youngest was probably five and the eldest had to be in her forties; their mother, no doubt. She sent me a cautious smile and I looked up at Parker, schooling my face to be as acerbic as it could on a twenty two month old face. 

I was likely pouting.

The fucking traitor smirked at me, carrying me closer to forced interaction with people who thought I was some baby. The ire burned holes in the back of my throat.

“Kumo, this is our family. We have three sisters and a mom; that makes six of us who live here. Can you say hi?” Did everyone feel the inherent need to be as patronizing as possible to children? I turned to the ladies sitting at the table, wondering if they knew that leaning forward in a way akin to anticipant vultures would be intimidating to normal toddlers. I offered a lazy wave.

“Hi.” The youngest one scrunched up her nose as the other three pinned Parker with a suspicious glance.

“She’s real… cooperative. Not like she was a while ago. What’d you do to her?” She must’ve been about sixteen, the one who spoke, all attitude and confidence. The forty-something stilled, face falling to an expression I couldn’t place. It made me wary. Parker, too, picked up on it and broke into histrionics, spluttering and crowing about their obvious lack of confidence in his boyish charm even as the quiet turned stifling; I couldn’t even suppress my grin. The kid was a ridiculous character. The fourth girl, maybe ten, pointed at me and giggled.

“Hey, she’s smiling! Maybe Parker didn’t beat her up,” she offered, asking the elephant in the room its entire life story and future aspirations. Parker glowered at her, sitting me on the table and making sure I was facing all of the occupants of the room. I felt like a lab specimen; the child scrutinized me, the prepubescent poked at me, the teen fucked with my hair, and the woman pinched my cheeks as Parker dished out introductions.

“This is the lovely Florence Reika; she gave birth to all of us”—Parker dodged a haphazard swat to the shoulder—“the ugly one is Florence Cho”—the teen lobbed a pen at his head; she had wondrous aim—“I’m the charismatic and handsome Florence Parker”—he jabbed a thumb at himself—“the stupid one is Florence Amaryllis”—cue an indignant ‘Hey!’—“the short one is Florence Maryanne”—she gave Parker a stink eye—“and you are obviously our resident star, Florence Kumo.” I gave the boy a lackadaisical smile for effort.

“How come she don’t hafta have a stupid name like everybody else?” the ‘short one’, Maryanne, asked Parker. She looked to be a permanently unhappy little thing. 

“’Cause she’s not stupid like the rest of you!” he exclaimed, pointing his finger to the air. Maryanne’s lip curled in anger and Reika frowned at him. “She’s totally the smartest kid ever. She’s even learning how to read,” Parker bragged, coming closer to ruffle my unruly curls. The teen—Cho, narrowed her eyes.

“ _Right_.” Parker grimaced, fully intent on defending my intellectual integrity. It was endearing, it really was, but tiresome. If he did what I knew he would, there would soon be a storybook in front of me and I’d have to display my “skills” in front of everyone in the room. Intelligence leads to expectation and next thing, **blam!** They’ll anticipate me coming up with a five-year plan to achieve world peace. No fucking thanks.

Alas, I was a hated individual in the circle of the cosmos, and what do you know? There’s a little book about a sea monster making friends with another sea monster suddenly shoved in my face. I regarded Parker with another glare (pout) as he sneered at Cho. 

“I ‘on’t wanna read.” My words were fairly quiet and less than articulate, as I was used to only speaking to Parker. I was sour about my lack of eloquence; while I was barely two, I had lost none of my obstinacy from Normal Land. 

Reika’s look of disbelief was a bit uncalled for; I assumed it was the effect of surprise. Surprise either that Parker wasn’t bullshitting, or that I was a rude enough kid to outright decline my older brother’s request.

“ _Parker_! Why is she talking like a boy?!”

Or I was wrong on both accounts.

Japanese has different forms for the word “I” depending on the gender of the person saying it. I could get away with the male form of “I” since it’s what Parker used and he was the one teaching me how to speak. It was an odd thing to be upset about, considering she had three daughters sitting right in front of her. My speech was a little rough, a little simple, and ultimately excusable for my age and situation. Reika was undoubtedly disturbed, though, as if the very prospect of me being remotely unfeminine was a sin and I’d be dragged to the depths of hell for it. 

It was unnerving, because _I was a man_. A very fucking traumatized man in the body of a female child.

“She look like a boy, too!” Maryanne crowed, a malicious smile on her chubby face. The brat seemed kind of fucked up. (She was the definition of _how_ fucked up one kid could be, I’d learn.) 

Parker frowned musingly for a moment then, ramming his fist into her crown, gave her a harsh noogie. “She doesn’t!” Releasing Lemon (Maryanne was too cute a name for the sour brat before me), he turned his eyes back to me. “C’mon, Kumo, read for everyone!”

“I ’on’t wanna.” Thinking about it, the interaction with this less than functional family was draining. “’M hungry an’ tired.” Good lord I sounded so childish. Nevertheless, my nubby legs weren’t suitable to swing me off the table; beyond that, my motor functions were still jerky and unrefined, weak enough that I stumbled now and again when trying to walk.   
I had absolutely no intentions of making a fool of myself in front of anyone, so I had to be taken back to my room by someone more developed, and I’m sure Parker was the only one willing to touch me without fear of getting bitten or something. He very well had me trapped and for my patience’s sake, I’d hoped he didn’t know.

“Maybe if you read a little, we can have snacks and a nap? That’s good, right Kumo? You can read and then you can eat and sleep!” At the dissenting shake of my head, his encouraging smile turned sly. Admittedly, I was a little curious; it was interesting what kinds of manipulation tactics the kid could come up with, however unsuccessful. “How’re you going to get down? If you try to get off the table, you’ll hurt yourself. I’m the only one who can take you back, so you gotta read.” 

Like a bull in a fucking china shop, Parker threw away an opportunity to get me to read with such a lack of finesse that I burst out laughing. Fighting back a smile of his own at my laughter, he poked my shoulder with a fake pout.

“Why’re you laughing at me?” Fortunately for Parker’s dignity, my vocabulary wasn’t developed enough to tell him he was the most tactless person I’d ever laid my eyes on.

So, instead of affording him an answer, I smirked innocuously and drew my legs up, lying on my side and assuming a comfortable sleeping position on the wooden table. (University in Normal Land had seen me fall asleep in places far worse during finals. Like that park bench covered in pigeon shit. I’ll miss you, college life.)

At the indignant wrinkle of his nose, likely from being bested by me yet again, I closed my eyes with an impish smile. Even if he was technically older than me, Parker was definitely my younger brother and teasing him was one of my favorite pastimes. The kid was thirteen and I couldn’t vocalize joshing remarks about his gangly limbs and peach fuzz; outsmarting him was the next best thing.

The thought brought me back to the times of my senseless longing for a sibling back in Normal Land, and the unpleasant feelings that came with them brought an unsettled look to my face. I’d really have to work on acute muscle control if I wanted the pokerfaced prowess and nimble extremities I used to have.

Another bullet on the checklist of bullshit I had to wade through.

The shift in my mood didn’t go unnoticed by the other occupants of the room, and Reika’s worried voice floated to my ears as I reopened my eyes. Sitting back up with a sigh, all the fun sucked out of playing with Parker, I granted him a stare of expectance. Noisy as the kid was, he was very intuitive when it came to reading faces. 

He plucked the book from where it dropped after my refusal and opened it up for me. And thus began a bored and somewhat choppy account of a lonely froglike sea monster finding an everlasting friendship with another sea monster who accepted him for his ugly frog body.

At the end of the story, Reika smiled, albeit dazed, while Amaryllis and Parker clapped, Lemon scowled, and Cho…

Well, I’ll never say Cho’s skepticism was a _bad_ trait.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm still in the process of hashing out a prospective update schedule, but it's up in the air because I'm a subpar disappearing performance.
> 
> akaname - red creatures that exist for the sole reason of licking up unclean bathroom dirt  
> ittan-momen - flying cotton strips that attack people and smother them to death


	3. The Wonderful World of One Piece

I know people thought I was a creepy brat.

If I wasn’t toddling after Parker wherever he went (sometimes to annoy the shit out of him, sometimes to expand my mental layout of the area) then I was huddled in a corner poring over a book. It took a few months for the house residents to get used to me, but after deliberation, I passed some unspoken ‘normal test’. 

Well, either that or my presence was downright unnerving, considering how they essentially shoved me out the door with Parker a few months after I turned two. With that, the world I had glued together with my fat little two-year-old hands was blasted apart. 

The day started off simple enough. I woke up early, as young children are wont to do, and jabbed Parker in the shoulder until he dragged his lazy ass out of bed and got me some suitable clothing. As I was much too short to reach the clothes on the middle shelf of the linen closet, Parker had to do it for me; he picked out a simple yellow shirt and pair of overalls for me – the dugong print onesie I was shoved into for sleep was not anything I’d lounge in. 

I waddled from our room in a fresh outfit and settled on the loveseat in the living room with a book on the adventures of some asshole that killed other asshole adventurers on the sea. A reoccurring theme amongst storybooks Parker gave me was that they all happened on the sea. Perhaps it was due to Japan’s status as an island that all of their quirky little books were about sea monsters or jackasses on boats, but it did grow to be redundant after a while.

At least I was learning new words.

As page after page of ‘Asshole went out to sea, _again_ , and killed everyone he met. _Again!’_ grew tiring, the rest of the household finally awoke. Amaryllis was first, bounding out of her and Lemon’s shared room to annoy Reika into consciousness. At the woman’s tired shuffling growing nearer, I flicked my eyes upward. 

“G’morning Reika.” She paused, glancing at me drowsily and mustering up a drained smile. It unnerved her to no end that I didn’t address her as ‘mother’ but how could I? How could I give her a title that meant—

_so much, so little, I’m dead, deaddead **dead**_

—I’d be lying to her? I couldn’t do that. 

The truth (always) hurt.

Her routine scan of our meager fridge must have come out negatively, because I heard her bustle over to Parker’s room and cajole him into buying some meat for brunch. Upon their exit, the teen groggily stumbling after his mother, Reika glanced at me and smiled. 

Weird.

“Bring Kumo with you.” Parker paused, gaping at her disbelievingly. He quickly gained his sobriety and considered her more warily. 

“…You sure?” She nodded, a bit fervently if you ask me. Her ploy to shoo me out of the house would’ve been almost imperceptible if not for that. I was more miffed at Parker’s reluctance, really. Huffing, I discarded my book and followed him out the door. Like I was going to subject myself to god-knows-how-long awkward “family” interaction. Yeah, fuck that.

He scrutinized me for a moment then sighed. I waited near the door as he changed his clothes and came back to the living room with a satchel. Reika had gone to her room by then. 

“Leaving! Love you guys!” he called, bending down and gesturing for me to get on his back. It was an economical decision, I reasoned as I hopped on. If I walked, I’d only slow him down with my stumpy legs. Four others were awaiting his return and it wouldn’t do good to keep them starving. 

The added bonus was that I didn’t have to strain myself in order to keep up with his longer stride. Lightly circling my arms around the tops of his shoulders, I craned my neck in every direction, savoring my first taste of the outside world. 

It was stunning. 

The heavy steps of my inelegant brother made the journey rough, though the experience of fresh air and verdant grass outweighed the slight discomfort. It was curious to see such flourishing plant life. Striped towers of trees stretched to the clouds and broken buildings sat upon their bases _as bubbles ascended from the ground itself and **I could not breathe**_.

While I retched up clear stomach fluids and my vision began to fade, the only thought on my mind was that outside world tasted like total shit. 

When I regained consciousness, everyone was huddled around me in the living room. Amaryllis babbled incomprehensibly and Reika’s hand was stationed atop my forehead. Lemon looked on confusedly as Parker marched around and Cho tried to calm him down, in her own way. (‘She isn’t going to die, numbnuts. Little kids get overexcited and their bodies can’t handle it. How stupid are you?’)

Reika noticed my eyes open and snapped to attention, showering me with nervous prods and distracted hand gestures. I waved her hands away distractedly and sat up, leaning on the couch arm and groaning hopelessly.

“Where’re we?” Parker stopped pacing, glaring at me hazily. I flinched, unused to that look. He rarely got heated. Sometimes exasperated and ruffled. Not _mad_. His gaze softened and I supposed his anger was residual from Cho’s berating. 

“We’re in the living room, Kumo,” he responded cautiously. Reika gasped silently and I almost rolled my eyes at the dramatics. I leveled him with a dry look.  
“Which islan’re we on?” I didn’t even have the mind to be pissed about my inarticulacy. He perked up, a relieved breath passing his lips. The others in the room (save Amaryllis and Lemon) also seemed to relax. They weren’t aware that fainting didn’t equate to amnesia. Those poor imbeciles. 

“We’re on Sabaody, Grove 16,” he provided.

My heart stammered.

_What the fuck do you mean Sabaody? Who do you think you’re kidding, saying ‘Grove 16’?_

I wanted to question him. Or rip my hair out. Perhaps call him a sick little liar. Maybe laugh. I could’ve asked. I could’ve fucking asked. Who the fuck did I think I was? Some fucking James Bond fledgling, hiding my identity and gathering top-secret information from this misfit family? 

_What the fuck was I thinking?_

It wasn’t enough I couldn’t pass on peacefully. I just wasn’t high up enough on the rungs. No, I was reincarnated. What kind of flowery nirvana bullshit is that? And then this shit. _This shit_. Why didn’t I see it earlier? I didn’t link the damn pieces. Sea monsters and assholes on boats? _Sea Kings_ and _pirates_. 

Of all the ridiculous and crazy tomfuckery to ever grace the warped contours of human conceivability, being reborn on Sabaody had to be the biggest shit stain on the list. I wasn’t even relocated to a sleepy island in the East Blue. I was thrust on the borderline of Paradise and the New World; a hop, skip, and jump away from Mariejois; and the most popular pirate, black market, and Marine hotspot on the ocean. 

It was **bullshit**. I was back to square one: angry as fuck and filled with magnificent vitriol. 

Slowly, disregarding Parker’s calls of my name and Cho’s narrowed eyes, I picked myself up from the couch and trudged to my room. It was still scarce, but the crib was gone and a nest of sheets took its place, so I plopped face down on the pile.

And screamed.

It wasn’t a tantrum, per se. I was justifiably angry. Who wouldn’t be? It’s always fine and dandy to cry to the heavens about the shit that couldn’t be helped and then wallow in self-pity; it was different to realize that a foreseeable outcome was always there, just muddled due to bad decisions. It was different to realize I was the one who made this so much worse.

Parker walking into the room interrupted my dismal thoughts. He crouched down, hand hovering over my back awkwardly as I brooded face down. Not that I could see him. It was just a _Parker_ thing to do. I could imagine him finally forgoing the back rub and patting my shoulder – and there it was. A small series of pats to my shoulder. His predictability would have given me some amusement had I not been so caught up in my own gloom.

As used as he was to my ostensible moodiness, he was horrible at handling it. 

“Tired,” I said, stamping out any following conversation. I needed time. I’d had two years but it was… _different_. Not as urgent. Not as overwhelming. 

Parker left and time passed. I let it, the sound of my own shallow breaths providing a distracting rhythm for my introspection. I had to let things sink in. 

I’d been _fine_. 

I’d been fine and that was the worst part of it. I didn’t grieve, I didn’t solve, I didn’t think. I lashed out and isolated myself and _pretended_ that I was managing. Through the fear, the shock, the bitterness, and the confusion, I pretended. And it was biting me in the ass.

I **died**. I had ideals and aspirations, dreams I was pursuing. I had a frigid relationship with my parents, but I loved them. Not in the conventional way, no. It was _understood_. I was… unhappy, admittedly. I had close to no social interactions, my life was crafted by underhanded justifications, and the world seemed to walk by and leave me behind. Things were stable. 

I didn’t love it. Not really. 

I didn’t love the late night trips, nor did I love the three AM alcoholic haze. I didn’t love the way my fingers shook when I‘d stay up through the sunrise, still wired from the double dose of vyvanse I swallowed almost a day prior. I didn’t love the incomprehension of waking up after downing unnecessary trazodone tablets, not knowing what day it was. 

I didn’t love the way I yearned to fix people when I was a broken excuse of a man myself. I didn’t love the way my few friends would _encourage_ me, not quite sure what to do with someone who didn’t relish living life like they did. I didn’t love the way my junkie buddies would clap me on the back and call me a genius, as if simply pursuing a goal was something to be lauded. 

The way I lived wasn’t living. I swept through each day perfunctorily and existed because it was expected of me. As a sentient meat sack, I was to participate in society. I didn’t love what I had in the slightest, but it was mine. 

I had every right not to love it because each minute belonged to _me_. Each grueling essay, each bad decision, each fumbled interaction – I made that. I could reflect on it and decide whether it was idiotic or ingenious. I could decide what I did or didn’t want.

I couldn’t do that here. From Usopp’s pathological lies to Garp’s intense desire for his grandchildren to become Marines, the plot determined everything. Compulsive reactions were endearing foibles and a shitty personality was a character flaw. 

Nothing here is genuine; the entire world is a ball of puppetry that revolves around driving Monkey D. Luffy closer to becoming Pirate King. 

If people weren’t racist assholes, Arlong wouldn’t have an intense hatred for humans and Fisher Tiger wouldn’t have become a slave. If Fisher Tiger hadn’t become a slave, he wouldn’t have formed the Sun Pirates to voyage with former fishman slaves to eventually disband and lead Arlong to the East Blue. If Arlong hadn’t gone to the East Blue, he wouldn’t have forced Nami into servitude and she wouldn’t have been robbing pirates. If Nami hadn’t been robbing pirates, she wouldn’t have gone off with Buggy’s treasure or met Luffy. Every action is a cog of machination centered on that kid. 

More than anything, it hurt to be conscious of losing my agency. I was beginning to think that maybe I could go swimming with a Sea King and see if anything different came out of it. What would happen after I died again? Would the cosmos forgive me? Or, would I be subjected to an endless cycle of rebirth into bullshit manga I used to read? It chagrined me to come to terms with my fear of such an outcome.

Sweeping out from the acrid pit of my stomach, pipelining to my toes and curling over the tip of my tongue, _I was afraid._

I couldn’t do it again. 

I couldn’t end this nascent life to be flung back into The Void and repeat and repeat _and repeat_. 

My chest seemed to cave, an ugly ache twisting around my entire upper torso, and—

_oh god—_

My autonomic nervous system was taking over. As I began to hyperventilate—

_oh god no_

—I curled into a ball; my extraneous limbs quaked—

_no no no_

—an influx of epinephrine, clenched fists—

_please no fuck_

—I had to keep from clawing myself in panic. The entire room seemed to thrum—

_fuck fuck please god no_

—accelerated heart rate affecting my retinal arteries—

_**fuck** _

—I could only curl tighter. 

I’m not certain whether I cried or not, though it’s likely my body’s parasympathetic region stimulated my lacrimal glands due to the intense response from the sympathetic region. (I cried like the fucking baby I was.) After a good twenty minutes, my gasping breaths calmed to unsteady sighs. I drifted my bleary gaze to the ceiling, somehow sure no one was near enough to walk in on me, and flexed my fingers. I felt a sense of tranquility. Each second seemed to slow, as if I had all the time in the world to stay on my back and respire.

I fell asleep to the sensation of my enervated lungs thinly pumping air.  


* * *

If I said I was mellow after accepting my reincarnated status, I guess I’d have been downright vegetative after my episode. It was at that point in my new life that I eliminated the word ‘fine’ from my vocabulary.

I _was not_ fine. 

I was going to work through that. Funny that I, of all people, forgot that the road to recovery is long and arduous. I suppose not being on the receiving end of that for so long fucks a guy up.

Any progress I had, however, was stunted by my inability to figure out where to go next. The events I knew about were scattered, largely undocumented, and weren’t particularly relevant to anyone except the Strawhats, anyway. _Everything was tied to Luffy_. What difference would it make whether Ace died or not, truly? Nothing I deigned to _do_ about future events would benefit a soul, save for Luffy and his crew. If I did want to change things (which I _really_ didn’t), it’d be to place a bet on his value. What was I going to do? How was I going to do it?

The most important question, though, was: _When was I?_

In this world, history is damn near unattainable. There are medical textbooks, maps, and devil fruit encyclopedias but the moment someone tries to take a step back, _there’s no space to_. The covetous nature of the World Government in regards to information is ludicrous. God, they fucking _slaughtered_ an entire island because its people were studying the Void Century. 

I became more aware of the sporadic gunshots and the tattered hand-me-downs everyone wore. The way no one left the house unless necessary and the way Parker always, _always_ affirmed his love for us before he went out.

The ‘tranquility’ was essentially numbness, allowing the fleeting passage of two weeks. I spent that time staring at walls and wondering why I continued to wake up. Cho’s eyes looked more evil by the day, Lemon and Amaryllis didn’t go anywhere near me, Reika uselessly pet my hair from time to time, and Parker tried his damnedest to improve my mood. 

It wouldn’t strike me until years later how susceptible my family was to my mood; I was the misplaced zephyr in a muggy quagmire. It was jarring to think of, so I tended to push it from my mind.

The Gallagher Clan thought I was possessed, I’m sure. I’d have called a fucking psychologist if I were Reika. Just imagine the reports. ‘The youngest child refuses to talk to anyone, can be found trying to articulate in the dead of night, and is prone to manic-depressive mood swings.’ Christ, I was a wreck. 

Possessed wasn’t too far from the truth, taking into consideration who Florence Kumo could’ve been. Was the birth of this body a means to get me living a new life? Or, was this the body of Reika’s real child, commandeered by the cosmos to be carved out and filled with my essence? I knew who I was, and I knew I was not Florence Kumo. Who was?  
I put off thinking about the potentially deadly future and my own moral discord in favor of gaining facts about the world I was two years in.

Yeah, ‘properly managing emotions’ is something I need severe help with.

The morning after I resolved to take some action, I woke up with disgusting dried baby drool on my chin and wrenched myself up so I could get some material. Wobbling over to Parker, who I refused to share a bed with regardless of relation (being “alone” for the majority of my time in Normal Land made me adverse to any sort of physical affection), I lightly slapped his face until he woke up.

"Wha… Kumo what issit? You have a nightmare?” It was…an odd question. I suppose _normal_ young children were prone to night scares (he was probably used to it from Lemon or Amaryllis’ earlier years). 

“No. What’s t’day?” I figured that would give me some bearing on how things worked here. Had they even developed weekdays? And months? Julius Caesar and Pope Gregory didn’t exist to fuck with the Roman calendar, but the Romans didn’t exist to create it. Of course, ingenious discoveries and transponder snails existed, so designing a lunar calendar and having someone fuck with it was probable. What about the month names, though? Where would July fit in? A bit troubled about the confusing discrepancies, I stored it away for later. 

Parker blinked, waking up a little more as he tried to answer my question. “The nineteenth, I think.” Numbered dates. That was a good sign.

“Of?” His brow furrowed. I was a little reluctant to deal with the clarity of his wakefulness, but I needed to know. 

“April.” So there was April. I briefly wondered about the date of my somewhat recently passed birthday. March? I prompted him once more.

“Year?” Parker sat up this time, getting a good, skeptical look at me.

“…1503.” I _almost_ balked, images of renaissance culture flashing through my mind. I ruled that out and chalked it up to the fact that everything here is a fucking anachronism. There were pirates and cyborgs; it’s a bad sci-fi-fantasy mash up. 

Even though I knew what year it was, it didn’t really help. Oda made a whopping total of _four_ references to any form of an official timeline. It was 1503. Great. What the fuck did that mean? Resolutely, I stared at him and pinched his nose.

“Teach me days.” His befuddled gaze was grating; I couldn’t say ‘teach me the principles of your calendar and the relevant dates associated with the time frame we’re in.’ Even these few short words were a lot.

As a rule, I cut down my attempts at putting together sentences in front of others until I was completely sure I wouldn’t sound like a bumbling child. 

Given that I was, it was mostly a matter of pride.

My comprehension of Japanese wasn’t dismal, so I didn’t have to fake being mute; I did have to maneuver around a lack of teeth and other inhibitors, though. For the most part, it was trial and error with me. I’d babble on about different things until I wasn’t sure how to say what I wanted to, and Parker took the rest from there.

I reiterated my request and repeated a few words of his. “Nineteenth. April. 1503. Teach me days.” He understood the second time and ruffled my hair. 

“Sure thing. Lemme sleep some more, okay?” I nodded, not in a great rush to have my imminent doom crash down on me.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm a shit author and shit person in general and no of course I didn't haha FORGET ABOUT AO3 POSTING WHAAAT HAHAHA NO OF COURSE NOT. SHOUTOUT TO MY BETA THOUGH.


	4. And the Clock Keeps Ticking

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have this story at its current rating due to mild imagery - by mild imagery, I mean soft gore. It's not going to be a constant thing, which is why it's "mild." I call it "imagery" as opposed to "gore" because while I get a little descriptive, it's nothing that's particularly horrible and it's not the whole chapter. A scene gets a little squicky, but no in depth recounts of evisceration or torture so I think we're good. Just be cautioned, I guess? I know everyone has different ways they react to even a hint of "oh man gross" so I just want you guys to know.
> 
> C A U T I O N : N O T. Y E T. B E T A. R E A D.

It was commonplace for Parker to teach me how to read from books, but bringing one along after I'd only asked for him to familiarize me with dates earned the kid a gold star. He must have noticed my excitement for new reading material (what can I say, I'm a sucker for proper communication), because he grinned and held the book higher as he walked into the room.

"It doesn't have a lot of pictures like the other ones… You'll read it, right?" I nodded. In his other hand were about fifteen sheets of paper and a pair of pens, which was pleasantly surprising. I'd expected paintbrushes, ink, and a fuck ton of frustration. I moved a bit more toward the center of the room for optimum writing space and Parker shook his head, mumbling about how weird I was.

He spread out two papers and kept the rest of the stack to the side. I grabbed a pen from him, stricken by how my stumpy hands couldn't properly grip the utensil, and tested a theory of mine. Scribbling down a wobbly 'A', I checked Parker's face for a reaction. His eyebrows rose in recognition and he ruffled my hair. "Where'd you learn that, Kumo? I don't know a lot about those, so we can talk about 'em later."

It made sense, for the English alphabet to be here. In Normal Land, English was one of the most spoken languages on the planet, so Oda had to have interjected English words here and there for audience appeal. I needed an indecipherable language medium to record the timeline, so Italian would be my best bet.

_Fucking wonderful._

Parker's chicken scratch in mixed alphabets was confusing, I'll admit, but after two hours of jumbled syllables and numbers, I had a better view of where my life was. It was April 19, Kaienreki 1503. Kaienreki roughly translated to "Age of the Sea." (Kaienreki literally translated to "calendar of the sea circle." Yeah. Age of the Sea.) There were two "calendars," or eras, which were comparable to BCE and CE – Kaienreki and Tenreki.

Tenreki, the Age of Heaven, is BCE; it's the era in which the people who passed down the legends of this world's accepted "history" lived. Next to nothing is known about Tenreki, save for sparse stories and myths. It's highly likely that the descendants of the families in the Ancient Alliance, like the Celestial Dragons, have concrete information, but they're an insane and megalomaniacal breed of human. So, no dice for the rest of the world.

Kaienreki, CE, is the age of exploration and men venturing the seas. The age of never-ending fucking conquests. From the construction of Alubarna to Noland's expedition to Shandora, Kaienreki was built on the fall of older civilizations. Kaienreki is also an age of innovation. The people of this era have cultivated more effective methods of transport, ways to deal with illnesses, and communications.

Every coin has two sides.

The One Piece world also uses the Gregorian calendar for no fucking reason. All dates and numbers, January to December, match Normal Land's. It's easier, yes, but sketchy on the world building aspect. This shit doesn't just pop out of nowhere. Who cultivated transponder snails as telephones without Alex Graham Bell? Where was Nikola Tesla in the cyborg equation? Why the fuck doesn't everyone have tuberculosis?

I stored it in the aptly dubbed "What the Fuck, Oda" box. I didn't need that kind of noise in my two year old life.

As we put the paper away, Parker gave me the book he brought with him. I commissioned him to get me a blank notebook before I started reading and, while it took a lot of charades on my part, he got the point. Thankfully.

The book he brought me was about plants and herbs. Plants in One Piece are wild. While Normal Land had curative herbs, modern medicine had rendered herbalism somewhat obsolete. Here, specific plant combinations could very well substitute lab made pharmaceuticals. There were the incurable diseases, as always, like what Doctor Hiriluk or Usopp's mother had. For the lack of certain technological advances, this world seemed incredibly evolved.

It was pretty amazing.

There were, unfortunately, kanji symbols I couldn't read. Upon bringing them to Parker's attention, I discovered that he couldn't either. It hardened my resolve to get the fuck out and find someone to instruct me adequately. I couldn't rely on a thirteen year old to return me to where I used to be scholastically. To where I needed to be. The rest of the day passed in scrawled question marks and sparks of irritation, but inspired a race for competence.

In the following weeks, I filled up pages of my notebook with words I didn't know and tried to push the plot out of my head. What was to say I wasn't born years before even Roger?

I also found out what I looked like. The bathroom in the Florence hovel had no mirror, naturally, so I was already two years old and all I knew was that my skin was the color of a burnt almond. It was the head that worried me.

Parker was understandably wary about bringing me to the market again, but apparently I'd shown him the most stability I had in a month because he approached me with caution and extended an invitation to accompany him on an outing to get food. Yet again, he carried me on his person, opting to seat me on his shoulders rather than his back. He stuck to winding around groves and covertly hiding in the shadows, trying to keep me entertained while complaining about the sun.

Swinging my legs around, I observed the vendors and merchants that grouped in the lower numbered groves. Parker galloped through different stalls and stopped in front of one that obviously appealed to the more conceited. Gold bangles and glitzy necklaces hung from polished silver staples, the walls lined by diaphanous scarves and pleated dresses.

He couldn't afford any of it, even if he wanted a gift for one of the girls, so it was obviously a scheme to appeal to the feminine side of me that didn't fucking exist. It was a tiny bit endearing that he tried. He swiped an intricate hand mirror and shot his arm up to hold it in front of my face.

And _holy shit_ I was not expecting it.

Looking different is trippy, yes. It's dissociative, where the features I'd assigned myself didn't fall in line with ones I once had, but that was par for the course when reincarnation came into play. What had me reeling was _my face_. Any identifying features were nonexistent, swallowed up by plump cheeks, a squashed nose, and beady little fucking eyes. I was a bona fide baby. _The horror_.

Pushing past that (more like stuffing it down), I drank in what managed to pop out. My _extremely_ curly hair was a warm russet, the red undertones stark in the bright sunlight. It appeared my eyes were the same reddish-brown color. Tilting the mirror with my head, and subsequently Parker's wrist, I watched red flecks jump out when light hit my face. I took a closer look and realized that my pupils were not circular. No, the eyeballs in my head had fucking slits. I probably wouldn't have noticed if the sunlight wasn't dilating them.

All of my features seemed to have a red tint, as if I was baked in hell's fire. My dark skin, my demonic eyes, my frizzy hair. It would only take a squint to pick out the crimson of my countenance. A lilt of the lighting or a closer look and then red, red, red.

It was so badass.

With a sharp grin, I let go of my brother's wrist. Yeah, the coloring would've been cooler in Normal Land where stuff like that was artificial. Kidd had hair that was shaped like a flame and Zoro's hair was _green_. I wasn't special, but it was still cool.

Our trip left me with a desire to learn how beri worked, which I tucked away for a time when I could focus my whole attention on it. Cho greeted us upon our return, swiping the assortment of vital nutrients we could afford (scarce fruit and vegetables, and not nearly enough protein for kids their age) and disappearing into the kitchen.

On the table was another book Parker found for me, and while he could read it completely, it still expanded my vocabulary. Next to it, Amaryllis doodled a mangrove and Lemon supplied her with broken crayons in the colors she called out. My brother situated me on the table, the action somewhat ritualistic in its frequency when reading time came along. He opened to where we'd last left off and maybe Amaryllis didn't see it the way I did, but stopping her mangrove illustration to stare at me while I tried to _learn_ was the opposite of helpful. (The amusement I got from Lemon snapping an already wrecked crayon won out the irritation.)

A few minutes into reading, we were interrupted by Reika. "Oh, look at my Kumo! She's going to grow up to be a scholar like you, Parker," she crooned.

Reika was…

Well. Being a single mom wasn't what I faulted her for. She had five kids and still managed to look like she was in the prime of her life, though she was in her mid-forties. Props. The contentions I had with her fell into the realm of proper childcare.

In my few months of observation, it would seem that Cho was more of a mother to the kids of the house than Reika. It was clear to anyone who took an elementary psych class that Reika was an amorous narcissist. She ran about wantonly with whichever man that would bed her and slunk away with a child in her womb. One after another, until her collection had grown to five living, breathing humans, and she played mommy only in title.

When Cho disagreed with her, when Lemon chose lizards over dolls, when Parker asked her to stop talking about our dads, she would rant as if she was slighted. Reika saw those kids as extensions of herself and no more; ideas to implement and play out like the fantasy in her head. And when it didn't go as she wanted, she whined about the "sacrifices" she made.

"I could've gotten rid of you! Instead, I lose sixteen years of my life, time I could've been traveling or studying, to _you_. And this is how I'm repaid?" or something of that ilk.

Florence Reika made me sick.

The witch knew, _she knew_ , that I rejected femininity in my life. When I was busy with Parker, she'd sneak in and try to cram me into dresses and bows.

If I bit her a few times, it was because I was a teething brat.

Aside from Reika and Oda's bullshit, my life was almost alright. Sure, I had no real intellectual stimuli, and I was really fucked up over dying, and at times the days blurred together a little _too_ seamlessly, but yeah. Almost alright.

The months slid along comfortably as I waited with unease for a clue as to where on the canon timeline I'd landed. My third birthday (the seventeenth of March, apparently) passed without too much fanfare, Cho and Parker unbelievably scrounging up enough beri to purchase a cake.

Then October 5, 1504 happened. It brought the headline that threw Sabaody Archipelago, and the rest of the world, into a period that could only be described as _**hell**_.

The Marines had captured Gol D. Roger.

* * *

Let me talk about the start of the Pirate Era.

It would seem inspiring – legions of men beckoned to the sea by promises of incomparable adventure and treasures. And it was, if that's why they were out there. However, a good ninety-eight percent of pirates are greedy, pillaging dicks with no idea what the fuck the word 'polite' means. Hell, they don't even know the definition of 'civil'. The Pirate Era was just a bunch of assholes on boats ready and willing to destroy any infrastructure they happened upon.

And they ravaged Sabaody.

The Marines staved off a few fleets. It was in the job description, after all. That didn't stop the equivalent of a market crash; the merchants that weren't massacred fled to pick up commerce in less dangerous areas and the archipelago went into famine.

The initial week or so was bearable. The Florence's thin meals stretched thinner and I slept more often to quell the crankiness that came from being hungry. The second week wore everyone down. Parker left the house armed to the nines, wearing a rusty shrapnel crowbar on his back and the harshest façade I'd ever seen on his face. Sometimes he came back with edible chunks of meat, eyes frantic and breaths heavy. Sometimes he came back with bruised fruit, roughed up with bloody lips or black eyes and the twisting in my stomach was leagues away from my growing appetite. The third week saw Parker with a broken rib (likely due to his stubborn resilience when dealing with pirates) and the last of our provisions.

Mischievous Amaryllis was actually quiet for once, Cho looked to be at her breaking point trying to keep Lemon calm while explaining to her why we couldn't eat, and Reika pontificated about how much better life would probably be if any of our fathers had stayed.

I gave my brother tips to help his ribs, making the excuse that I'd read it in a book, and lamented my stupid baby body that couldn't handle a few days without food. At the mark of one month, five days without food, I understood why Sanji would beat a man to near death for being wasteful.

Reflexive _hunger_ is the worst pain I've ever felt, in this life and the last.

As a (former) med student, I know how starving works. A few hours without food and glucose, a carbohydrate responsible for most of the energy the body needs, begins to deplete. This prompts hunger because the body is running out of energy. If days pass with no regular intake of glucose, the body enters ketosis, producing more ketones than normal from fatty acids and gleaning energy from them.

When the body has used up all of the energy converted from fat, it moves on to the muscles. Autophagy sets in. The body breaks down the proteins in the muscles and sends those amino acids into the bloodstream, thus manufacturing more glucose at the cost of emaciation. Afterwards, it goes into what most people call "starvation mode," where it adjusts to keep its proteins, using the least energy as possible.

And isn't it wonderful that the worst of this happens in the leading three days?

From a medical standpoint, it's a fixed and simple process. But it's _so much more_. More than just a lack of carbs and energy. More than just deteriorating muscles. The brain, as any organ, _needs_ energy to function. Conscious thought becomes superfluous in the face of wondering how long the body can hold out. Self-awareness falls to the abyss and survive is the only leading thought in the rapidly failing mind.

Hunger is a nightmare.

It's watching helplessly as children waste away.

(Because while Cho liked to act mature or while Lemon was sour as hell, they were _sixteen_ and _seven_ ; watching a too tough teen put on a brave face for her younger siblings and watching a child's tears dry is _fucking shattering_.)

It's a bleak vie for stability when your mind is picked apart by desperation only suitable for fucking animals, terrified helplessness coupled with the transformation.

(But Reika was useful and Amaryllis was witty and if _mother dear_ just fluttered her lashes while Amaryllis snuck by and swiped even crumbs to tide us over they could make a quick getaway _why didn't they understand_.)

It's the willingness to sacrifice anything, **anything** to stop the feeling of your body destroying itself.

(And the pain, the _aching pulling roiling_ of my stomach making its way up, up, up my throat as I listened to Parker huff and clench his teeth as his arms curved around his middle it'd be over soon it had to _it had to_.)

Hunger is fear.

Hunger is _hate_.

 _ **Hunger is torture**_.

At night, Cho or Parker would go out and occasionally victual water. I'm sure Sabaody was a wasteland. Beyond the pirates, there were the other inhabitants to deal with – the bounty hunters and the sorry fucks who were stuck in the lawless area of this godforsaken archipelago. They were in the same situation that we were.

One of my clearest memories was the first time interacted with the barbarian residents of Sabaody.

It was Cho's turn for an excursion that night and she'd come back with a full canteen, the most we'd seen in a good two weeks. She knelt down and pushed the bottle to my lips. As youngest, they always made sure I got my share before anyone else. At the start, I tried to refuse. Because I was not supposed to be with them and I was an extra burden for this family but I was in so much pain and _I didn't want to die_.

Penury makes us weak, I suppose.

So, I drank a bit of water and went to my corner (specifically mine because I was a fucking corner urchin and liked to stare at the ninety degrees where my self-hatred and universal hatred seemed to converge).

As Amaryllis began to sip, our door caved in. Two men ambled through the threshold, gaunt and obviously unhinged (the image of shaking hands and crooked grins still sticks with me).

"What's this?" one croaked, wired eyes giving us all a once over. He was significantly shorter than the man behind him and gave the impression of a mindless brute. I called him Brutus. Simply his posture was foul, something acrid in the way he breathed, something _wrongwrongwrong that's not **right** that's—_

"A waste o' space," the other rumbled. As Brutus' companion, I termed him Cassius. They both snickered, and I distinctly recall those sounds being identical to dying cats. Unsavory, rasping wheezes. He hefted a plank of wood over his shoulder, managing a glib smile at Cho. "Well, som'body's junk is someon' else's treasure."

"S'pose yer right. Li'l missy here led us ta the jackpot!" Brutus swept forward, taking Cho's chin in his hand and flashing a spacey grin. "Real suprisin' cuz I'd thought ev'rybody done left Sabaody."

"Either that er the'r dead," Cassius supplied. Cho jerked backward, scrambling away from Brutus with a snarl on her lips. He made a dismissive sound and straightened up.

"We want yer food," he stated. Parker had shot up, bony fists (much too small for his age) balled at his side.

" _You think we'd look like this if we had any damn food!_ " His voice was much louder than I'd ever heard it. There was an unfamiliar echo within it, and I came face to face with the type of rage my brother held. It was rough. Sloppy. The type of anger that meant gnashing teeth and blind obstinacy. Like a cornered dog.

Reika shushed him, pulling him down to where she sat on the floor as he shook, and, as I'd glanced at Cho, I saw the same expression on her face. Only a portion seemed to be directed at the men, however. I could see an almost emptiness in her eyes, the type that came when people couldn't properly look at themselves to fully convey the emotion. Cho hadn't covered herself well enough, and she knew all of us were paying for that.

Reika spoke up, a quaver in her voice as she tried to placate the men. "We don't have any food. Barely enough to get by. My son and daughter have been trying to find us water but we—"

"Don' lie ta us! Think there'd be six o' ya if ya'd had no food? We ain't stupid," Cassius growled, visibly adjusting his wooden board.

"We _find_ food," Cho snapped, standing up with her hands planted on her hips. "We need to find more because there's more of us but we're alive the same way you two are."

The two grinned.

"I think I got doubts 'bout all o' that." The admission was sly and the instinctual fear that lanced through me is a feeling I can never forget. Warning bells or spidey-sense or whatever the fuck people want to call it—mine was _blaring_. Cassius stepped forward, his presence grasping and dank and _get away no get the fuck **away**_.

The swing was quick, shooting out toward Cho's temple and it would have surely killed her had she not been a native to Sabaody Archipelago. She ducked, keeping low and sinking her fist right into his crotch.

_Oh god ouch holy shit._

He crumpled, dropping his plank of wood, but Brutus jumped over him with a dagger and managed to slice a deep gash into her upper arm. Parker ripped away from Reika, rearing his fist back ( _maybe the size of a baseball not made for fighting no—_ ) and smashed it into Brutus' nose.

Cassius, recovered from the nut shot, yanked Cho down by the ankles and sank his teeth into her bleeding arm. The scream she let out was so guttural that I'd have mistook her for a beast.

Reika was white in the face as she clutched a bawling Amaryllis and Maryanne to her chest. In my corner, my blood froze.

_Fucking cannibals._

Parker slammed his heel into Cassius' nose and I'd wondered if he had a proclivity for fucking up noses, or if the shot was just easy for him. Brutus lumbered over, smeared blood on his upper lip, and decked my brother with a blow _to the throat_. Keening, Cho tugged the larger man's head away from her arm by the hair and sprang back up to drag her nails across Brutus' face. He sunk his fist into her middle but she held on, thumbs scrabbling around the corners of his eyes before _digging_ in.

Interestingly, enucleation isn't fatal. Vision isn't a vestigial adaptation, no, but the vitreous, which shapes the eye, doesn't even have blood vessels. It's a great gelatinous casing for retinal arteries and veins, though. The retina is an extension of the optic nerve, which is basically a pipeline directly to the brain since both are part of the CNS. And, of course, the sclera holds all of the ciliary arteries. If someone had their seeing squishy gouged out it'd hurt like a motherfucker; excruciating and awful, yes, but not deadly.

Cho's encroaching fingers, nails a centimeter or so away from the tips, jammed into his eyes around the cornea and sunk as far as they could go. Her hands stopped at an angle, nails likely scraping along the retinal casing the way her wrists were turned, and I watched blood drip down Brutus' face like the horrified tears she sported. She wrenched her hands back as he screamed and clutched his face.

He yowled and thrashed, backing up into the wall and spitting curses and screaming _and screaming_. I was never faced with that before. Never in burn units or delivery wards or trauma centers had I heard a human cry sound so primitive. Never in the rest of this life would I hear it again.

It was almost fascinating the way his hands subtly roamed over his ocular cavities, searching for the eyes that weren't there anymore. His knees buckled and _he would not stop screaming_. Each hoarse caterwaul made me think of how many people he'd consumed. How many bones sat in piles, sinews stripped away by his teeth. How many lives he had under his belt as I watched him writhe in fear and terror, spreading blood all over his fucking face.

A piece of myself told me he deserved it.

(Another, quieter piece asked me where the fuck my humanity went.)

Cho, ever the quick thinker, grabbed Cassius' wayward wooden board and cracked it into Brutus' face. Repeatedly. What killed him could've been the multiple blows to his nose, causing disruption of venous communication between the facial vein and the brain. It could've also been the fact that she crushed all the bones from his cheeks inward and gouged his fucking eyes out, causing hemorrhagic shock from the blood gushing out of his face.

Who's to say.

Parker, distracted, was toppled over by Cassius and I heard his leg snap as the man growled curses and grappled with him violently. Cho knocked the plank over the back of the man's head and Parker grabbed his neck, squeezing with his little hands cupping the sides of the man's chin. Cassius choked and sputtered and kicked until he was blue in the face.

And then it was over.

There were no victorious smiles. No relief. No calm. No comfort. What happened wasn't heroics, it was _survival_.

Cho's hands shook fiercely, muscles taut from adrenaline and arm doused in blood. Parker struggled from under Cassius' limp body and heaved against the wall, throat beginning to bruise as he respired in strangled gasps. Lemon wailed into Reika's middle while Amaryllis hiccupped uncontrollably, both curling into her as if the stained yellow sundress she wore would offer them shelter from the world. And I stared.

I stared into the hollowed eyes of a man whose name I didn't know. His bloody sockets stared back and I thought I saw Cho's chipped nail polish at the corners, light blue flakes resting on the sallow cheek bones of the corpse. She kept her nails long, likely for self-defense. To survive on this pretty island where slavery was an insidious fact and her rape or murder would be written off as another common occurrence.

I stared at the other, his neck snapped so brutally, so _inefficiently_ by a kid who had his life at the bottom rung since day one. One long contusion, the width of Parker's scrawny arm, marked his neck. His eyes were still open.

Glazed and dead, staring right back at me.


	5. Silly Grownup Things

Cho and Parker had to drag the bodies away from the house and throw them into the water so we wouldn’t have to waste away with their rotting flesh. No one said a word when Cho deliberately grabbed the man she _hadn’t_ killed, or when Parker took the other.

We didn’t have the materials to splint Parker’s leg, which sported a broken tibia, or to disinfect Cho’s arm. The man could’ve had all sorts of infections festering in his mouth. I convinced her to clean her arm in the ocean, as the salt would help sanitize and seal the wound, but there wasn’t much else I could do for her. With my slight guidance, she used a dirty old shirt and the wooden plank to secure Parker’s leg poorly, and we didn’t talk much after that.

I don’t think I ever saw my sister the same way again.

Our brother was reflexive in nature, and had been just the same in the… _altercation_. Each blow handed to him he’d exchanged in kind, even down to killing ‘Cassius.’ Cho, however, took action. There was a part of her that was merciless, that would maul and murder if her continued existence was the end goal. It was heartless in a way she wasn’t.

Then, maybe she was. She must have had a specific mental lock box for her morality because of Sabaody. Must have had to put it away when she needed to scrape a few dollars or twist a few arms.

It was hard to reconcile who I knew my sister to be with who she had to become to function.  

In the passing of five weeks, we shriveled and bloated, too ill to tell the difference between reality and feverish daydreams. I didn’t find myself hungry or thirsty anymore, my body finally accepting its lack of nutrients.

It was during a delirium of Gol D. Roger indefinitely getting his dick stuck in his zipper as he suffocated within the sulfuric walls of hell that the front door rattled. Reika listlessly scrambled away, guiding Amaryllis, Maryanne and myself with her. Parker was helpless as he sat against the wall with his slow-to-heal leg and Cho tensed. Not that she could do much.

Perhaps my siblings, desperate and slightly starved, had the adrenaline and drive to stave off two undernourished cannibals. Now, they were little more than skeletons with skin stretched over their bones, hazy eyes straining to focus for _more than a few seconds, shriveled organs taking up the least amount of space in their bodies they were dying oh god they were **dying**_ —

Now, there was nothing we could do.

The door was kicked in, splinters flying around and a booted foot halfway in the frame. I’ll never really know if it was a good thing that the men in front of us were Marines. Maybe, we could’ve died back then. Died like so many others and never had to live another day on Sabaody.

(The thought is unpleasant. When my days go on too long, I can hear the noises from the— _killer, monster, no, not man, he was anything but a_ —man Cho killed and think that, maybe, I’d have liked to go out as well. It seems better, at times.)

But that didn’t happen.

A small herd of Marine officers swarmed into the house, looking over us with a blend of disgust, contempt, and (worst of all) _pity_. It made my blood boil. We weren’t abused fucking puppies, waiting for them to throw us scraps. Who the fuck did they think they were, insinuating themselves into a situation that had already blown over, ready to take credit for saving the day when they did all of _fucking nothing_ to ebb the decimation of so many lives? Who the fuck did they think we were, mindless plebs willing to venerate them as our motherfucking saviors when two children had to _kill_ to keep us alive?

From the start, I felt our meeting with the marines would be inauspicious. I looked into their eyes, fury dyeing the world in red hues. “Is everyone here all right?” In the subsequent silence of his question, I thought that, if it were another day, I would have chuckled. Shot him a caustic question just as idiotic and laughed in the man’s face. It wasn’t another day, though, and I was far too drained to drag a smile across my face, let alone a laugh from my throat.

Cho had no problem. “All right? Are you really asking if we’re _all right_?” she sneered, once-full lips, now cracked and thin, curling back. A few in the back bristled and the one in the front frowned.

“There’s no need for that attitude, girl,” he reprimanded, his apathetic civility turned to affronted derision.

“Attitude’s the last thing **you** should be worried about. We’d be _all right_ if you Marines had done your damn job instead of throwin’ us to pirates so that the Celestial Dragons had extra lapdogs,” Parker rasped.

_Ouch._

There was a twisted sense of pride that blossomed inside me when my brother said that; with it came poignant bitterness. Gone was “the charismatic and handsome Florence Parker.” In his place was a boy forced to grow up too fast. He’d probably never see life the same. Never find value in goofing off. Sabaody took that away from him.

No. No, that wasn’t right.

 _Gol D. Roger_ took that away from him.

“If you have enough nerve to mouth off like that, you brats can’t be too worse for wear,” he spat. They left with the same suddenness they came, leaving hot tension and a broken door in their wake.

Cho clenched her fists, teeth grinding as she fumed. “ _Bastards_!” she shrieked hoarsely, getting up on wobbly legs and immediately falling to her knees. “Bastards, bastards, _bastards_ , bas…tards…” Her voice cracked as it struggled to carry words and she curled in on herself, panting and coughing out dry sobs. Ignoring Reika’s soft cries, Parker’s sniffles, and my own bone deep pain, I crawled over to my sister.

Cho and I would never be close. I can’t say if it’s because of her perceptivity or my intrinsic lack of trust, but anything closer than ‘siblings’ would never apply to us. I’d always be wary of her and she’d always be occupied with acting more adult than she actually was. I wasn’t spiteful because of that. We were different people.

Collapsing next to my sister (my deteriorated body wasn’t in the right condition to be doing such laborious things as _moving_ ), I grabbed her hand and waited for the spots to dance out of my sight. Her fingers were spidery, nails cracked and overgrown. I couldn’t tell if the dried blood around her cuticles was from when she stuck her hands in that guy’s eyes or from picking at dried skin. They were tiny for a girl her age. Sixteen. Or was she seventeen? Her hands gave the impression of a twelve year old. They weren’t bad hands. The middle finger was longest, followed by the ring, index, pinky, and thumb. Artistic hands. Nimble and expressive.

Feeling rain on my face, I looked up. But it wasn’t rain. It was just Cho leaning over me, getting her tears on my face. Her long black hair made a curtain around us, though it was dirty and matted. She looked so drained. Much older than sixteen, or seventeen, or whatever age she was.

It was… sad.

Unlike Parker, Cho never got to enjoy her youth. There was too much to do in picking up Reika’s slack, I’m sure. Reika was more the clumsy and caring older sister and Cho the mother. It was Cho who brushed Amaryllis’s salmon pink ringlets every morning, Cho who kept Maryanne from throwing tantrums, Cho who made sure Parker balanced pranks with reading, Cho who first worried how I became so mild mannered, and it was Cho who made us feel like a secondhand form of real family.

I squeezed her hand tighter ( _only a bit she’s so so fragile_ ) and sighed. “’S not fair.” She nodded, stroking my hair whilst she wept. “’S not your fault,” I murmured. Cho looked down at me, tears still running down her face, and blinked.

“Wh-What?” she whispered.

God, she was just a kid.

If Cho hadn’t taken up the responsibilities that she did, no one else would have. To bear that stress all alone must have been fucking awful. If anything went wrong, if she had any lapse in judgment, she had to have thought that it was her fault alone. That no other factors played a part other than her error. That’s not how it worked. She didn’t get to hold herself to those standards at that age. It wasn’t her fault. She was a fucking kid and _it was not her fault_.

“’S not your fault,” I repeated, patting Cho’s cheek with a formerly fat hand. Mine were almost as spindly as hers, though not as elegant. She didn’t deserve to think she could’ve helped any of this. She didn’t deserve what Sabaody did to her.

Cho bit her lip, a broken cry erupting from her throat. Squeezing her eyes shut, she pulled me close and wailed into my hair. I continued to pat her arm until she fell asleep atop the pile of wood chunks. Soon after, I, too, faded from the waking world into a dead slumber. 

* * *

The archipelago’s reconstruction was taxing. The hospital – glorified clinic, really – was only helping those with immediate need of assistance.

Sabaody bred a brand of people that made me achingly homicidal. From supercilious Marines to haughty quack physicians, those who didn’t have to wade through the filth of the archipelago thought of themselves as better than the people who lived in the lawless district. 

+``

The reason I decided to go to med school wasn’t because of my parents, nor was it my aptitude with organic chemistry. They wanted a lawyer and, while I excelled in science, I preferred the arts. It wasn’t because cardiac surgeons made about half a mil annually (before taxes, of course) and it wasn’t because I had some sick ass desire to cut bodies open.

I’d wanted to be a doctor because the gratification that came with helping people made me feel whole for once in my fucking life.

There wasn’t much I was good for. I could tinker around on instruments (only actually played one), drew like shit, painted a bit better, and hacky sacked like a motherfucking champ. I had nigh perfect color acuity, chess was one of the few board games I deigned to invest myself in, and I emulated cartoon voices pretty well.

My single boundless talent, however, was interpersonal intuition. 

If people needed someone to talk to, they went to me. If they had a secret that tore at the seals of their lips, if they were feeling like shit because of their dead uncle, if they were screwing around with three others at the same time, I was the guy they went to. I was the one they spilled their fucking guts to, digging up their dirty secrets and shunting them off on me so that another could share in those carcinogenic truths. I never knew if it was my lackadaisical attitude or my natural silence that attracted them. It didn’t matter.

Helping people with their psychological issues was insubstantial to me. I never fully knew how effective those talks were. I wanted to _really_ help people, not talk about feelings and hope for the best. The results needed to be tangible for me – I needed to know that I was making a fucking difference. So I nosedived into pre-med as soon as high school ended and didn’t even think of looking back.

(Because if I did, if I regretted my decision for even a moment, everything I knew would fall to shit _and_ _I couldn’t_ —)

Not once.

Even if the majority of human beings are complete dicks, being able to give people even a small bit of hope made for one of my few life goals. As the doctor – glorified nurse, really – gave us a once over in his spotless white coat, nose wrinkling and expression glazing over, I asked myself why in god’s name this piece of shit would ever consider taking up health care if the sight of _his fucking patients_ was so tasteless.

_ What kind of dumbass wears a coat, anyway? We’re sitting in a giant box. He doesn’t even have a pen in that damn front pocket. Where are his gloves? Christ, just throw us back to the Marines. _

The… _doctor_ sighed and pointedly looked from Reika to Cho, the latter holding me on her waist and barely supporting Parker while Amaryllis and Maryanne grasped their mother’s skeletal hands. “Only one family at a time,” he snipped. 

In the same tone, Cho replied with a simple, “We _are_.” His expression turned even more scornful, likely due to the implications of our _unique_ sibling diversity, and he gestured us forward. Unsurprisingly, his cast work on Parker’s leg was subpar and the noxious poultice he rubbed on Cho’s arm was too late to have any effect.

(Her left bicep would always sport a warped scar.)

Behind him was a basket of bread loaves and large water canteens. With a smarmy ‘One of each per family,’ he showed us out. I held carefully to my sister’s thin neck and looked around as we left. The crumbling old buildings were nothing more than rubble in the aftermath of Roger’s legacy, gaping craters wherever pirates had scuffled and piles of dead bodies strewn anywhere there was manmade destruction. Famine was still rampant and although trade picked up, no peddlers were willing to settle in an area so dangerous. 

Our door had been replaced by a stained curtain and the barren sitting room was cleaned of stray wood. There was just one thing I had to make clear. “I read in my plant book,” I started, watching everyone’s eyes turn to me, “’bout food. You’re not s’posed to not eat for a long time. If you don’t eat for a long time your tummy”—oh god how I wished to articulate the word ‘stomach’—“gets littler. An’ when it gets littler, you can’t eat a lot ‘cause it’s too little and you throw up and lotsa other bad stuff happens. I’on’t wanna throw up so I hafta eat a little. An’ you guys too,” I finished quietly, watching as Maryanne and Amaryllis’ faces screwed up in confusion and the others grimaced in sluggish understanding. 

That was obviously an oversimplified version of actual inanition and refeeding syndrome, but my vocabulary and patience wouldn’t do anything to help their understanding. I felt awful for saying it, but making them face that conclusion on their own was indisputably crueler. Baby steps and all that shit. 

The feeling of food trying to settle in my stomach after seven weeks without it was enough for me to give the loaf back to Cho after a single bite. The bread was only slightly stale but I couldn’t swallow it. God, it was awful. Why was it so fucking bad? When she pushed it back to my lips, I shook my head. Nothing could make me take another bite. My body was malnourished, my stomach distended, I hadn’t eaten in weeks, and _I would not eat the bread_. 

The pain, coupled with my stark inability to figure out why the fuck I was so angry about some damn bread or why I couldn’t fucking eat, burned my eyes. Burned them so much that I couldn’t see, the figures of my family blurring into splotches of color; burned them from the inside out, singeing my cheeks and nose and neck; burned and burned and _seared_ through my skull, thrumming heat waves crashing into the backs of my eyes as my raw flesh scorched with humiliation and baseless rage. 

Crying sucked. 

(It was even worse when vomiting out the contents of an almost empty stomach.)

* * *

It took five months for me to get re-acclimated to eating. Five months of forcing bleached flour and water down my palate as my body simultaneously welcomed and protested the act. Five months of intense meditation, drawing up memories I needed and tamping down others the moment they resurfaced. Five months of flooding my notebook with a muddled rendition of canon. Five months of cursing Gol D. Roger’s name. 

My fourth birthday came and went, and I realized the Canon Crisis was worse than I’d thought. 

It was to my knowledge that Portgas D. Rouge gave birth to Ace almost two years after carrying him in her womb. (It was utter bullshit what Oda thought he could get away with. Two fucking years? _Really_?) Obviously Rouge had to have known she was pregnant before Roger died, so Ace would be born maybe a year and a half after Roger died? He was three years older than Luffy, who’d be seventeen when the story starts. Shit would hit the fan about twenty two years after Roger’s capture, then. At the very least, I’d have to wait ten or so more years in order to gain the bodily maturity needed to be self-reliant. That brought me down to twelve. _Twelve years_.

Beyond the complex plot and extraneous details that ended up being important for God knows why, the worst part of the Canon Crisis was constructing a cohesive storyline. Yeah, I knew that the Straw Hats raised hell at Enies Lobby before they got to Sabaody, but how far apart was that? Did I have three weeks or three months before the New World was thrown to hell? I’d be – what? – twenty five? Fucking hell I only made it to twenty three in Normal Land.

( _Only twenty three oh god I could’ve had so much I was so young such a fucking idiot fuck if I’d just_ —)

I had a decade of waiting, and then twelve years to leave Sabaody, secure a safe place to live when every single island was subject to pirate attacks or Marine interference, and make a living for myself in a place where no one is safe. 

Ha.

* * *

Weeks ran together in a way that I hated being familiar with. My vocabulary developed as I prepared for the downfall of civilization, and things were… better. Not good. Parker still woke up in shakes. Amaryllis seemed to get sick every month. Maryanne swung into unpredictable bouts of hyperphagia. 

_ (It was always cold.)  _

I’m not sure it’d ever be good, or if it ever was, but the everyday coalesced into something tolerable. The archipelago worked to rebuild itself as pirates continued to multiply, apprehensive whispers telling me that Whitebeard’s reach had finally expanded to Fishman Island and was continuing into other parts of the New World since Roger’s death. From the two or three times I left the house, anyway. I kept myself in the company of books rather than my housemates, and my older siblings’ tagalong offers were near nonexistent. It wasn’t until Reika returned one day, winded and ashen, that I understood why. 

She’d arrived in a flurry, slamming the shoddy door behind her as she caught her breath. Hurriedly, she scampered to Amaryllis, who was busy with another crayon creation, and littered her face with kisses. Flying from child to child, she did the same for each (much to my ire). “What’s wrong, mom?” My brother lightly held to her shoulders and she looked to be shaking slightly. 

“There were Celestial Dragons out today and I just—I don’t know, I couldn’t get home fast enough. It was so unexpected! Oh, I’m just so happy I could make it home,” she puffed out, planting another kiss on my brother’s cheek. 

“ _Celestial Dragons?_ ” Cho’s face was a mix of resentment and dread. “Why would they be out? They never come on the island.”

_ What?  _

“Didn’t they used ta come over?” I asked. My diction had improved considerably, though I still had drawling stumbles. It was better than ‘tummy,’ anyhow. 

Reika shook her head, looking at me with a bittersweet smile. “No, sweetheart. The Celestial Dragons stay in Mariejois and the Marines take care of everything. None ever come down here, except when… silly grownup things get in the way.” Like slave trade. 

In canon, Celestial Dragons were very much a presence on Sabaody. The citizens in the manga were all but inured to them popping up to torment whoever and put in a slave order. Of course, the auction house must be out of business because of—

Oh.

_ Oh. _

Wasn’t that a thought. In the event that their personal human mill suffered greatly due to the crash, ensuring that nothing went _wrong_ would only take a few visits to their subjugated archipelago. Their despotic and pious train of thought ran along the ‘if I show up, no dirty pirates will ever get in the way again’ track. Which, unfortunately, was correct. Anyone who fucked with them, or their immoral form of entertainment, were an admiral away from death. 

Seeing a Celestial on the island was a new thing, then. A chilling novelty that we’d only get used to as the years went on. 

Twelve or twenty two – I’d never have enough fucking time. 


	6. Braxton's Boys

By the next February, tension was at an all-time high due to the increasing frequency of Celestial Dragons appearing on the archipelago. Outside of that, I was content. Cho had secured a lucrative night job and, although my limbs were still wiry and I’m sure we’d gone through unmonitored refeeding, we had food. Reika was (to my begrudging understanding) upset with her daughter. 

Cho was a stripper.

Stripping was an _exceedingly_ dangerous occupation on Sabaody. Shady as fuck didn’t begin to describe what those joints were like; I’d seen a few the last time I was out and, even in the daytime, I could _taste_ the cheap sex and even cheaper booze in the establishment. The only reason I knew about my sister’s livelihood was a midnight rendezvous with a book she’d purchased for me. She and Reika were arguing lowly and I caught the tail end of the older woman threatening to kick Cho out for being a ‘whore.’ Which was, in my honest opinion, a fucked up thing to say. 

My older sister was nineteen years old and capable of making her own decisions. Perhaps if she was doing lap dances and business fucks in the kitchen it would warrant such a venomous reaction, but she kept any traces of her employment away from the house. Pole dancing didn’t automatically equate to sex services, either. If Reika was genuinely worried about her daughter, I’d understand. Even in Normal Land, stripping was the last thing someone would want their child doing; it opened up gates to prostitution, domestic abuse, and drug addiction. 

Her quiet exclamation of, ‘If anyone finds out that you’re a damn _whore_ , what will they think? Men are gonna think you’re easy and you’ll never find one who’s gonna treat you right. I raised you right!’ left me with doubts. 

(In a sick way, it was amusing that _every single attempt_ Reika made to have a poster family was destroyed. From her first-born being a stripper to her last being an alien of sorts, the woman couldn’t catch a break.)

For my fifth birthday, I received sweets that I could barely stomach and an assortment of books.  It was fully expected that the next day’s headline was a photo of the inferno that consumed Ohara and an editorial about a demon girl, her seventy-nine million beri bounty slipping from the folds of the newspaper Parker came home with.

If ‘fully expected’ translated to ‘a left field whim of the unkind and wicked cosmos.’

It had been a good seventeen months since I’d encountered relevant plot and sometimes it slipped past me that _I was in One Piece_. 

_ I’m on Sabaody fucking archipelago and Gol D. Roger turned my life upside down and Nico Robin is an  _ eight-year-old pariah _staring at me through a papyrus bounty poster._

_ Good god. _

The next month, Shiki the Gold Lion broke out from Impel Down. Fear of Roger’s rival and the prepubescent Devil of Ohara sent everyone along the Grand Line into anxious panic. The weak businesses on the archipelago flickered between struggling to support themselves and shutting down as buzz around the island worried when Shiki would make his second coming. 

A year passed and, even though Shiki was forgotten,  Nico Robin’s name never quite died, still snaked around the tongues of those who knew the danger of a mere scholar who could incur the wrath of the World Government. Upon turning six, I was allowed to go out and socialize with the other young ruffians of Sabaody to “make friends.” Lemon and Amaryllis were popular in their circles, prompting Reika to encourage me to leave the house.

At six years old. 

(Never mind that all Lemon did was flay fish and then play with their entrails with her other friends while Amaryllis’ gang vandalized property and stole shiny things from vendors. True Sabaody kids.)

I worried a little about being kidnapped and _sold into slave trade_ , but my siblings were fine, so whatever. I took an oversized kitchen knife and tucked it into my pants, in any event.

* * *

Walking around the groves unsupervised was a nostalgic feeling. Alone with my thoughts and surrounded by trees, it was reminiscent of how I used to spend my free time in Normal Land. There were clear differences, like me being a small child and there being sketchy-ass dudes hanging around every corner, but the sentiment stood. Caught up in absorbing the ambiance of rising bubbles and silent trees, I was late in reacting to a harshly yelled, ‘Move!’ and knocked to the ground.

“Ya dumb kid! I told ya ta move outta my damn way!” a trilling voice spat. Looking over, I saw that my assailant was a pint-sized brat. His clothes were ragged, his dark hair was greasy, and a few of his teeth were missing. 

_ He has the fucking nerve to call me _ — 

“Get back here ya li’l urchin!” a man roared. I saw a portly man hauling ass over to us as I cast my eyes up, red in the face and royally pissed. The boy scrambled to his feet, gathering an assortment of fruit I’d failed to notice, and raced away. 

The pissed guy, quickly gaining ground, shifted his gaze to me and I knew that if I didn’t follow after that kid, I’d be fucked. Classic “wrong place at the wrong time” scenario; I’d seen enough damn movies. Pissed Guy would think I was in league with Dirty Boy because of the short conversation we held and then proceed to take his frustrations out on me. I didn’t know a whit about the grove layout and the boy looked like he wasn’t new to snatching food. He was my only avenue of escape.

So I ripped myself from the ground and tailed him.

Which, while not the best idea, was the most appropriate at the time. My clumsy six-year-old footfalls alerted him to my trailing and the little fucker actually tried to shake me, leaving me to the screaming merchant seventy feet behind us. His obvious advantage in losing people was his size, which I shared, so it did fuck all to help him get me off his ass. 

We ended up leaving Pissed Guy behind on Grove 22, slipping through roots and making our way to the side of a deserted building on Grove 27. 

“Why tha hell’re ya followin’ me?” I still managed to communicate a solid ‘Fuck you’ with my eyes as I was folded over my knees, wheezing and gasping for breath. Likely attributed to my pupil shape. Which he immediately jumped on. “Y’r eyes’re weird! How’d ya get ‘em like that? Ya some kinda snake freak?”

I hated kids. 

After I regained my breath, I introduced myself out of civility. “My name is Florence Kumo.” The kid raised his nose.

“ _My name is Florence Kumo_ ,” he mocked, sneering as he pitched his voice up to imitate me. “Why’re ya talkin’ like that? Y’r not a _princess_.” 

_ Fucking ridiculous. _

With the Japanese language, the way that someone speaks can serve as an indication of social status. Nobles and the like speak formally, tending to enunciate their words with precision and ridding themselves of any vernacular. Those of ‘lower caste’ use contractions or familiar language patterns. Kind of like how someone would perceive an accent straight out of Baton Rouge compared to the hyper articulated tongue of news anchors. Sabaody natives have rough dialects and informal speech, so men in the bodies of small children who have no desire to speak improperly are seen as pompous wannabes. Even so, I’ll be damned to harbor any characteristic that will make people write me off as _less_. (All I had was my pride.)

“I’m a boy,” I snapped nonetheless, glaring at him. Amazing how a child can be no more than eight years old and such an asshole. 

“Ya look like a girl!” he crowed with mirthful, cruel laughter. I had half a mind to punch him in the nose. After a long period of excessive laughter, he continued. “My name’s Antonio. Why were ya followin’ me?”

Frowning, I supplied a simple, “I wasn’t gonna take the fall for something I didn’t do.” I wasn’t sure if he was capable of following my line of logic. He nodded, though.

“That old bastard’ve beat tha shit outta ya.” I grimaced. “Y’r not stupid, then.”

“I could say the same to you.” At that he sneered, and I shot him a wicked smirk. “How old’re you, anyway?”

“Seven.” He puffed out proudly. “What’re you? Four?”

“Six.”

“Y’r not six! Y’r too little!” I raised a brow at him. 

_ What kind of narrow logic. What. Is that how he perceives age? Size?  _

Granted, it was usually an accurate summation, but other factors lent themselves when it came to such. Then again, he was seven. Seven year olds don’t know much about that shit. Or anything else, for that matter. Exactly why I never deigned to associate with any. “I see,” was all I said. Then, I walked my happy ass back in the direction we came from. Pissed Guy was likely back to… doing whatever he was doing before he was robbed by a seven-year-old, and I had exploring to do.

Light pattering notified me of Antonio’s presence. “H-Hey! Wait up!” I didn’t. Soon, he caught up to me, which I could chalk up to the fact that I was walking at the pace of a winded six-year-old, too tired to do much else. The boy jogged in front of me, crossing his tan arms over his chest as if his scrawny presence held sway. I stopped, mystified as to why he wouldn’t let me leave. 

_ The little thug probably wants to shake me down. _

“What do you want?” God, I hated kids.

“I told ya ta wait,” he grumbled. Then, he perked up. “But anyways, since ya ran with me that means we’re partners in crime now.” 

“No it doesn’t,” I dismissed, continuing to walk around him. I wanted to chill with mangroves and get Reika off my back, not entertain a child. 

“Yeah, well, y’r a bad partner anyways! And y’r stuck up and nobody’d wanna go do stuff with ya ‘cause y’r no fun!” he hollered at my back. 

_ How heartbreaking. _

The walk back to my house was a little disorienting, as I wasn’t entirely paying attention to my surroundings. I made it back nonetheless, grunting in affirmation when Reika asked if I had “any fun.”  I didn’t have fun at all, but telling her that would make my day more tiresome than it already had been. 

The next day, Cho gave me a couple hundred beri (which was chump change in reality, but from a working woman supporting a family of five it was a small treasure so I made sure she knew how greatly appreciated it was by giving her _two_ gold stars) and I set out to buy some cool shit. The early morning market was slow, but the temperature was warm and the setup of stalls was interesting to watch for a while. 

Once the bustle died down, I made my way to a peddler selling baubles and ‘exotic’ foods. ‘Straight from the West Blue! Only 250 Beri!’ the sign read. On the corner of his table were what I took for fruits; they were bright pink and somewhat oblong with deep green sprigs. For some unexplainable reason, I wanted to eat one. 

However, outside of my family, no one beyond that Ant-whatever kid had heard me speak. Admittedly, simply asking to buy some fruit was daunting. Or terrifying. Whichever. The man behind the stand was looking over some papers, so I knocked on the wooden front to catch his attention. He glanced down at me. “Shoo,” he said, turning his gaze back to his papers.

“I wan’eda make a purchase,” I ground out, politely as possible. In hindsight, I sounded as bratty as I felt. He grunted, not bothering to look at me. “… _Excuse me_.”

“Go away kid.” I clenched my teeth. Perhaps he thought I was a beggar, not worth his time for all the sales he could be making if he ignored me. I grabbed the wad of change Cho had given me and counted out two hundred and fifty beri, which was possibly about three dollars. I wasn’t entirely sure about conversions, as I had no money to need to know if I was being ripped off or not, so I hadn’t consistently sought out lessons on beri. Cho had given me five hundred beri. I couldn’t see half on the weird fruit as being too much of a sacrifice.

I slammed the money on the side of the booth top and watched in mild satisfaction as the man jumped and looked over to my palm. “I wan’eda make a purchase,” I said again, looking at him pointedly. He leered down at me, shivering at the sight of my eyes. I couldn’t actually see his shoulders shake, but I knew. I always knew. The reaction was customary, after all. 

“Sorry, kid. Not enough.” I blinked, somewhat taken aback. 

“The sign says two hundred an’ fifty beri.” 

He looked down at me condescendingly, and his voice took on a mockingly apologetic coo. “This sucks, but that’s only for the _afternoon prices_! Right now, the price is one thousand beri.” The smug lilt to his voice enraged me. 

“That’s…! You’re _lying_ ,” I snarled.

He grinned down at me. “Take it or leave it, kiddo.” I fumed, putting my money back in my pocket and grabbing a pink fruit.

Which I launched at his head. 

(I stayed just long enough to see it impact his nose and took off running.)

* * *

As much as he paraded around denouncing my personality, Antonio wouldn’t leave me the fuck alone. I didn’t think I’d run into him again (I tried my damn hardest to leave the house in sporadic intervals so I’d never see him, the pissed merchant, or the other guy who I threw unidentified fruit at), but somehow he always managed to find me and try to induct me into his gaggle of unsupervised children. Because I “wasn’t stupid.”

I wasn’t exactly _above_ verbally demeaning a seven-year-old, but Antonio was little more than a gnat to me and not worth the effort it took to talk. He was easy to tease, though, as most kids were. I could also make up whatever bullshit I wanted and he believed it. It took three months of him annoying the fuck out of me every day to finally cave in and take a look at his group of little hooligans. His exuberance at my agreement almost made me physically sick.

Grove 32 was the hub for illicit child activities, it seemed, because there were more kids running around in that one spot than I’d seen in the last six years.

_ Has it already been six? Six years in this hell and everything is  _ **_ wrong _ ** _ why the fuck did this happen to me? Why why why whywhy— _

“Hey! Are ya listenin’ ta me?” Antonio had grabbed me by the arm and shook it a bit. Snatching my arm away, I flicked him between the eyes. 

“Nope.” I could taste his exasperation.

He huffed. “I _said_ that ya were gonna prob’ly make tha others mad tha way ya talk  so try not bein’ such a showoff, ‘kay ? And don’t—” I tuned him out again. I didn’t give a fuck about the fragile pride of children. _At all_.

The shabby building Antonio led me to was small and shifty. He went around the back, knocking out a simple pattern. “Password,” a squeaky voice called.

“The Sea King swims at midnight,” Antonio whispered. I choked down a snicker. Kids were fucking rich.  The door swung open and my companion scurried in as I followed at a more leisurely pace.  The inside was concrete and cobwebs with a low, water-damaged roof releasing foul scents. Dusty crates lined the short walls, giving the room less space than it already had. Spread atop and around those crates were about fifteen kids, ranging from around six to thirteen. The one who’d answered the door was short and a little bulky – still waiting on his balls to drop if his voice was anything to go by. 

From my peripherals, I saw another boy, probably the oldest, point his dirty finger in my direction. “Antonio who da hell is she?”

“He’s a boy, dumbass,” Antonio defended. A gold star for him, definitely. (He was considerably behind compared to Parker’s nineteen, Cho’s fourteen, and Amaryllis’ three.) The other boy, however, was about to be torn a new one.

( _I’m not female I’m not I’m not I’m a man who is somewhere a world a body a life he isn’t supposed to be in somewhere **wrong** I’m not fucking—)_

He reacted the same way Antonio had, laughing derisively and mocking my appearance. 

“You look like more of a girl than I do,” I drawled. “Those pants of yours seem snug; if I had no nuts, I guess I’d make the same wardrobe choice.” A few of the others laughed and, while I got no particular satisfaction from cutting him down, I wouldn’t let _anyone_ disrespect me. Not even a child.

He began to stomp over to where I was and, for the first time, I locked gazes with him. My eyes tended to serve as deterrents to confrontation, other people afraid of the serpentine qualities of my pupils. “ _Whoa_ ,” he whispered, rage completely forgotten. “Ya eyes ah so cool! Hey, lookit this kid’s eyes. They’a awesome!” True to form, the rest of the building’s residents listened to who I could only assume to be their leader, gathering around me and trying to get a look at my eyes. 

While they usually instilled fear in others, awe worked just as well. As long as it stopped the disembodied feeling of him punching me in the face, his anger almost physical in that I could see exactly what he aimed to do. 

“What’s ya name, kid?” the same boy asked. 

“Florence Kumo.”

“Kumo? Ya the one Antonio keeps blabbin’ about! ‘Kumo’s a jerk, Kumo’s so smart, Kumo, Kumo’!” Antonio slugged him in the arm, to no effect, as the boy laughed and mocked him in a high-pitched voice. “Well, Kumo, I’m Braxton. Wanna join us?”

I sighed. “Not really.” Antonio, obviously, was both miffed and puzzled. 

“Why’d ya come, then?”

“To shut you up.” 

He paused, eyebrows drawing up as his mouth thinned. His entire essence seemed to curl in. “Oh.”

_ Fuck.  _ Fuck _. How amazing, I just destroyed his confidence. What do I do? I can’t reason with him, he’s seven. God, I should stop him from crying… Fuuuuuuuuuuuck._

“I was kidding, dumbass,” I grumbled, testing out the new word. Swearing wasn’t oft in the Florence household, no matter how rowdy the kids were. Cho would shove soap even in Amaryllis’ mouth for the stray bad word. Antonio was pacified by my answer, yet still a bit misty-eyed as the rest of the boys snickered at his plight.

“What does this… group _do_ , anyway?” I asked over them, unhappy with potential constraints or agreements a bunch of felonious children may try to place on me.

Another kid, maybe eleven, stepped forward. “We help each other get by. Food, supplies, whatever – it’s us against _them_.” I could only assume the ‘ _them_ ’ he spoke of were the unsympathetic and scornful adults of the archipelago. 

There were quite a few reasons I ended up agreeing. I wouldn’t be subject to Reika’s relentless worry, for one. She wanted me to network socially and that was the closest I was going to get. At the same time, I wouldn’t have to suffer through Antonio’s pestering. I’d have the attentions of fifteen _other_ children, but a good few were young teens. Plus, while intellectual stimulus was a beautiful myth at that point, it gave me ample room to amuse myself at the expense of miniature people with no ability to defend themselves from verbal barbs. I’d be having _fun_.

(There was another reason, of course. One that solidified at the base my throat, that twisted and _ached_ and burrowed into my tendons, that told me the universe didn’t care, Sabaody didn’t care, _no one cared_ , that told me to act, make the world regret ever dismissing lives like ours, _make it pay, make it burn_ _, make it **hurt** , just like I did._)

It all really boiled down to one line of thought.

_ Crying seven year olds? No thanks. A ragtag militia of malleable, world weary youths? Sign me the fuck up. _

* * *

We raised hell wherever we went. We robbed the dicks who thought it was acceptable to deny a child with good tender, extorted the wayward brat who thought they could steal from our warehouse, and were the worst name in prepubescent crime circles.  The people who spat on our heritage, the ones who scorned our existence, the ones who'd kick a child when he begged for  _scraps_ to tide him by, we ruined them. We didn’t have any official name, but kids around the islands called us Braxton’s Boys. However, it’s not in arrogance that I acknowledge our infamy was wholly my doing.

The good thing about kids is that they're little sponges; cuss around them and their vocabulary will see the word “ass” and “fuck” more than it does anything with substance. Organize them and they run like a fucking syndicate. Gone were the days of wayward children making a scene and limping away with a few rotten fruits. I made sure Braxton’s little assholes knew the risks of unorganized work and being captured. 

We threw "keep the merchant preoccupied and sneak food away" out the window. My methods were more severe and more effective. We had the scapegoats, who would run up and blatantly swipe some merch to lead the vendor on a wild chase if he was fast enough. The older kids usually did that, as they had more stamina and longer legs. I didn’t think I’d have to teach them to run in the _opposite direction_ of the base, but kids don’t think ahead for shit. Once the merchant was away from his wares, the takers would snatch all they could carry as the watchers kept post. We had free reign, taking what looked good and going on our merry ways.

(It honestly wouldn’t occur to me to grab cash until much later.)

We became something like a group of Robin Hoods for the other dirty kids of Sabaody, and I saw sallow cheeks become fuller over time, showing them how to wash their fucking clothes and care for themselves like hygienic human beings. Some days I stayed in and read, and they all did fine without me, but if Braxton was the leader then I was the unofficial voice of reason. If he was ever unsure of something, everyone’s gazes went to me. The little monsters showed me around the island, places to hide and where never to go, safe havens for brats like us, and all sorts of useful shit . Shit that they didn't know how to  _use_. 

Granted, kids didn’t quite have the foresight to fully take advantage of the things they knew, nor the influence. I capitalized on what was available to me. The safe havens were plastered with our presence, ‘BB’ painted on the walls and small packages of food or trinkets left there for whomever came upon them. Word of our generosity and tact spread among other vagrant kids and orphans, and we were _known_. It built us insurance. If the merchants beat our asses, other brats had our backs. If we were low on food stores, we could go to other groups and ask. 

I had good books, a great collection of inventory from Sabaody vendors , and two years seemed to snap by, Braxton falling under an apprenticeship and leaving the title of ‘boss’ to me. Never mind that I didn’t fucking want the responsibility of that job and told him so multiple times. I was eight, then, running from stalls with pilfered goods and pocketing whatever grabbed my eye; sometimes I almost forgot where I was. 

Other times it slammed me in the face.


	7. The Second Law of Thermodynamics

Physics dictates that heat increases the entropy of the universe; perhaps the ever-chaotic nature of the Florence household was due to the heat of their exchanges.

Cho had moved out the prior year, Parker landed a job on a fishing boat, Amaryllis (whom everyone then called Amy) weaseled her witty little way under the tutelage of a businessman, and if Lemon wasn’t having a screaming fit about one thing or other that Reika did for me and not her, then she was waltzing around the island shirtless, smelling of fish and being mistaken for a rowdy boy. (Three consecutive years of psych courses that followed each new edition of the DSM manual told me she exhibited the early stages of juvenile bipolar; I told myself I wasn’t a fucking shrink.)

Amy was sixteen, riding out the end wave of puberty and still thinking she was the hottest shit to hit the scene, while Lemon was twelve, just getting in touch with her hormones and acting like she ruled the world.

How sparks would _fly_.

We went on ‘family outings’ to the market occasionally, and every time I felt like I’d die a second time from laughing. Lemon flit around stalls touching things she wasn’t supposed to and flinging the occasional ‘fuck you’ to anyone that called her out. Amy would run after her and yank her by the hair, both biting and screaming at the top of their lungs. Reika invariably played the role of a horrified bystander. “Whose kids are _they_?” she’d murmur, looking on as any normal participant of society seeing underage savages wreaking havoc would. 

At those points, Parker and I would veer off and find a shady little patch of grass to sit on while everything calmed down. He’d always grab a couple of fruits or other sweets and we’d look up at the sky, trying to translate clouds into sensible shapes. I almost tried to show him a bowling pin before it occurred to me that maybe bowling pins weren’t a thing in One Piece. I didn’t remember bowling ever being introduced to me, although there were roller coasters and billiards.

More frequently than he used to, Parker would reclaim his role of “big brother” and, by some miracle, convince Amy and Lemon to pretend they were civilized humans until Reika finished shopping. Amy was usually better behaved; Lemon brought out the worst in everyone she was around. In fact, I rather liked Amy sometimes. Our interactions were strained, though, thanks to my involvement with BB.

Amy was incredibly wily for such a well-adjusted kid; I supposed that no one left Sabaody, and the Florence residence especially, without a few vices. I turned to small time crime as a means to benefit myself. Amy, on the other hand, plainly liked troublemaking. She had a collection of followers who would harass vendors for the sake of harassment, which made it even harder for the orphans, without homes to hide in, to escape Sabaody’s malice.

About a year ago, a few of her friends and some the boys from BB got into a little… _scuffle_. Braxton was still with us back then and, through my advisement, arranged something like a meeting. I hadn’t known that Amy was involved, only that a group of other Sabaody kids who were making everyone else look bad decided it was a good idea to beat up a few of our members.

Imagine my surprise at seeing Amy stroll up with her little gang of eight other girls in tow. My initial idea was to have Braxton and a few others beat the shit out of them, but five years of knowing a kid makes you feel a little bad about doing the “sic ‘em boys” routine on her. 

Braxton had balked at first. “Why’s there a buncha _girls_?” 

A tiny thing with deep blue hair snarled at him, purple eyes flashing. “Why’s it matter we’re girls? Still kicked _their_ asses,” she says, pointing a knobby finger toward the quartet of boys who were involved in the original altercation. The rest of the girls giggled, almost pushing Braxton’s rage into the realm of tangibility.

By nature, the kid was a bit of a sexist. Not quite the “go in the kitchen and make a sandwich, wench” type, nor really downright misogynistic. However, he had the idea in his head that men were just better at everything than women. Fighting? Stealing? Tying shoes? Boys did it better. There were advantages men had over women, such as their capacity to build lean muscle and their biologically larger build but, even in Normal Land, “male superiority” was complete bullshit. 

There are physiological differences between the two primary sexes and that’s about it. The capacity to do well, in life or anything, depends on the individual. If you suck, you suck regardless of the parts in between your legs. Men are superior? Stronger? When I was sixteen, _so full of angst and ire, peddling my overpriced marijuana, I had all the time in the world it felt like there was none at all, too soon_ too soon _I shouldn’t have—_

** When I was sixteen ** , I knew a boy named RJ who dislocated his shoulder by throwing a punch that didn’t land on anything. At one point, I accidentally hit him in the face and his lip completely split open. He was that pitiful. In Normal Land, society trounced on women throughout the ages. For what? Women are normally smaller and physically weaker, yes; how does that diminish their worth? It’s a barbaric assumption that the ability to punch someone in the face dictates worth. Insidiously, that idea invaded _every aspect_ of female life until they were deemed undeserving of living life like men could. 

How does someone fight that, in a caste ruled by the ones who continue to tarnish their value? Normal Land was a man’s world – before the rules were made, before the reparations began, Normal Land was a man’s world. Men stole and rape and pillaged and killed and killed _and killed,_ twisting everyone’s perception of reality since they murdered everyone who argued the truth. 

Not unlike the pirates and World Government of this era. It was irksome how that type of mentality could permeate the uncombed depths of a fucking Japanese manga. 

“You should see how well all of you do against all of us then,” he spat. Our number was almost double theirs; it was an unfair proposal. 

Hopping off the little crate I was sitting on, I shook my head. “Bad idea,” I called out. Amy instantly whipped around and I could practically see the gears turning in her brain. My escapades in leaving the house, the surplus of food I always offered, the newfound intent in my demeanor. It was like she’d been quietly pondering those mysteries for a while and at that moment, all at once, everything made sense. Her nose wrinkled as I offered her a wry grin. The other girls, seeing her reaction, didn’t give me a warm greeting either. 

The blue-headed spitfire piped up. “Who’s _she_?”

“He’s a boy, stupid,” Braxton scorned. The kid had almost as many gold stars as Cho, though he couldn’t compete with her penchant for buying me books. 

Amy, ever the edifier, opened her mouth to speak, but I gave her _the_ _look_. It wasn’t a look I used in the Florence household – it was the look I gave vendors on my bad side, the look I gave the boys when they got on my nerves, the look I gave people who mistook me for a girl. It was a look I had perfected to allow light to play tricks with my eyes as I shadowed them, letting a bright, glowing red reflect from under my furrowed brows. It was all I could do to keep her from talking. Amy’s shock at the glare outweighed her ability to speak for a long moment and then she seemed to recollect herself, saying nothing. 

“My name is Kumo,” I said. “Braxton, it isn’t fair to fight these girls. There are more of us then there are of them.” 

They all took offense to my comment. 

“Like that matters!”

“Yeah, only two of us got four of you, so shut up!”

_ Perfect. _

I crossed my arms. “Alright, then, which two of you were the ones who caused this issue in the first place?” 

They all quieted down when the noisy blue-haired girl and a chubby girl with blonde hair stepped forward. Braxton grumbled at the four boys who got beat up by ‘blue stick and yellow blob.’ The girls in question stuck their tongues out in his direction, blowing raspberries and giving him the finger as they dragged the bottom lids of their eyes down. I sighed.

“What are your names?” 

The blonde spoke. “I’m Setsuko and she’s Celia.” The small one, Celia, roughly shoved her elbow into Setsuko’s side, hissing out ‘ _Why would you tell him that?_ ’. Setsuko shrugged. I liked her attitude, I decided.

 Looking back to the four, I urged them forward with a tilt of my head. Braxton stood to the side, giving me a small look of confusion but letting me have my way with the situation. (I hadn’t realized yet that he was giving me an exceptional amount of liberties with BB, prepping the others for my lead and letting me get used to it. There was a piece of me that truly hated him for blindsiding me with my own arrogance.) “Introduce yourselves.” 

The boys were uncomfortable as they called out their names.

“Henry.”

“I-I’m Nobu.”

“…Lensen.”

“The name’s Poshon, don’t forget it!”

The boys had a wary look in their eyes as they introduced themselves to their female attackers. It took a lot of effort not to laugh. 

Watching the awkward staring contest got tiresome after all of them started fidgeting uncontrollably, so I cleared my throat. “So… what happened?” I knew that I had made a mistake when the six children in front of me tried shouting over each other so their story could be heard first.

“Shut up!” Amy called. They gave her nasty looks and she smirked in return. 

I didn’t know Setsuko or Celia that well so I set my sights on the boys, evaluating them. Poshon exaggerated everything, Nobu would lie so as not to make the other boys angry, Henry was sexist with a very black and white viewpoint, and Lensen didn’t like to talk. Lensen, regardless of how he felt about using his voice, was the most trustworthy to provide an accurate account of what happened. 

I turned my head to the orange haired boy. “Lensen, what’s this all about?” The other three started to shout about how Lensen couldn’t even talk, why was I asking him, and how I always did weird stuff. Braxton came over and gave them all a wallop on the head to shut them up. 

Lensen scratched his cheek and groaned a bit, speaking up after a while. “We was all walkin’ around an’ stuff and those girls,” he looks to Celia and Setsuko, “come outta nowhere with a buncha stuff in their hands. Course they was gettin’ away from merchants but then they stop right in fronta us. Say ‘Here, take some stuff.’ Course, we didn’t want nothin’ from some weird girls, told ‘em so, but they kept tryna give us the stuff. Merchant comes up ‘round then and we start to run and drop the stuff they was tryna give us. They dropped their stuff too, since they come up after us and start yellin’ like it was our fault they couldn’t keep their keep. 

“Henry told ‘em they was stupid for losin’ their stuff and the li’l one socks ‘im right in the eye. Course Poshon grabs ‘er hair and Henry gets ‘er in the stomach. The big one comes up ‘round then to help ‘er out, then it got messy ‘cause I jump in to help Henry and Poshon, and Nobu comes in after me. The li’l one kept throwin’ out haymakers and the big one was sittin’ on Nobu and bustin’ Henry in the face. I was tryna hold the li’l one back from wailin’ on Poshon but she bit me, Kumo, she _bit me_.” His voice dropped to a whine at the end.

Celia stepped up, pointing a finger at Henry. “How’s he not gonna get hit after tellin’ us we’re stupid for bein’ nice!” she yelled. Setsuko nodded in affirmation.

“You and your fatso friend should learn how to go on your way when someone says they don’t want your shit! No means no! Respect my decision!” Henry snarled back. I immediately cracked up, clutching my stomach and wheezing. Henry was around twelve at the time, as jaded as any Sabaody preteen could be with his motto of “us against _them_ ,” but I tried to instill morals in him and the other boys. We had many lessons about consent and mutual respect, the word “no” and others’ decisions about their own bodies. I’d never expected him to bring my teachings up in this scenario. 

_ I do not consent to your gifts! My body, my rules! _

I was _crying_ from how hard I was laughing. 

“Oi, oi, shaddup Kumo! Yer the one who said this stuff!” Poshon cut in. Braxton sighed and Amy gave me a look that clearly translated to ‘You’re _nuts_.’ I calmed down and cleared my throat. 

“You two – Setsuko, Celia – empty your pockets.” Setsuko did as she was told, sharing a look of confusion with Celia, who crossed her arms instead. I blinked and then tilted my head, giving her _the_ _look_. “Pockets. Empty them… Now.” Her shoulders seized for a moment before she turned her pockets out into bunny ears. I gave her a small smile and she pulled her lips back in a grimace. How those girls had fit a small pile of trinkets, fruit, and pocket change into only four tiny pockets was beyond me. “Alright, boys, take your pick.” All four dove toward the pile as the two girls stood stunned, eyes bugging out and jaws dropping. 

“Pick?! _That’s our stuff_!” Celia shrieked, ready to yank the boys away from her and Setsuko’s shared pocket junk. Before either girl got hold of the boys, I stepped in between them. 

“First you try to pin your theft on them, then you beat them up. It’s only fair you two pay up.”

“Whaddya mean ‘pin our theft’? We were bein’ nice! _Nice_!” Celia was red in the face with the volume of her screaming. I took Setsuko to be the strong, silent type with her lack of contribution to the conversation but distinctly displeased expression. 

I shrugged. “So you say. If you’d rather, the two of you can keep your stuff,” they perked up, “and fight the sixteen of us instead.” The boys behind me cracked their knuckles as I offered up a twisted smirk. Setsuko rolled her eyes and backed off as Celia stood with her fists balled up, knowing she couldn’t possibly win with those odds. She turned to Amy, eyes pleading. 

Amy was a pragmatic girl, for all her rabblerousing. It’s why she and her group were there in the first place; instead of being perpetually rivaled with us, a position where she’d only ever lose, she agreed to show up so we could fix this issue. I had decided the resolution and she could either accept what I’d chosen or allow a brawl. It could’ve been a fight wherein only Setsuko and Celia got their asses beat to make up for Henry, Nobu, Lensen, and Poshon, which was the original plan. If she didn’t like that, it could’ve been a nine girl versus sixteen boy battle, where a good number of us were older than the respective nine, six, and eight years of Poshon, Nobu, and Lensen. 

I took Setsuko for maybe thirteen to Celia’s seven or so. Amy, at fifteen, was definitely the oldest. She knew that she and her girls wouldn’t win. We had a larger age pool, which made for stronger fighters, and seven more pairs of hands. I’m sure she also recognized my pardon for what it was; her girls busted up our boys and we were ready to do the same. I had made this easier for her. It was a calculated retreat when Amy shook her head, and I respected that. 

Celia didn’t take it quite as graciously, lip wobbling and eyes getting suspiciously bloodshot. 

God, I fucking hated kids. 

I snagged a golden bangle from Poshon’s hands, ignoring his cries of protest (was I was still ruffled from him telling me to shut up? Probably). “Hey.” The girls turned around and I looked right into Celia’s watery purple eyes, tossing the accessory to her. She wiped her tears with her forearm, sniffling and quickly turning away. “Quit picking fights over everything,” I said to her back.

Amy confronted me when she returned home that day. “Saa, Kumo-chan got mixed up with the bad kids,” she said, plopping down next to me as I read a book about fish in the North Blue. I hummed in reply. “Why do you pretend to be a boy?”

“… I don’t.” 

She paused for a moment and frowned, not saying a word as she got up and went to her room. Since then, our interactions had been on the awkward side. 

(At times, I wonder if we would’ve been closer had I recognized her position in my life that day, had I said, ‘My name is Florence Kumo, and that’s my sister.’ I’ve never been entirely sure why I didn’t, but the decision was made and Amy didn’t clear things up for anyone. 

There are certain decisions a person makes and truths they must live with that time won’t allow them to change.)

* * *

I suppose it all really began when I was out with Antonio and Minoruba.    

Like most of the other boys in the BB clan, I’d first encountered Minoruba when Antonio brought me to the hideout; he was the designated password-checker-slash-bouncer. He had a huge gap between his two front teeth, sandy blond hair, and a very stocky figure for a nine year old. In the passing years, he became my second left-hand minion along with Antonio. (My right hand was my own _right hand_ , because how much trust could I honestly place in a child?) 

Back in the times where I had to resort to it, pick pocketing was reserved only for those dumb enough to flaunt their money. (It took a few years to move past my ‘arbitrary stealing’ phase.) A pouch of cash really wasn’t anything to the guy going around and asking vendors to break five thousand beri bills. Antonio and Minoruba acted as distractions, going up to vendors without enough money to pay and grabbing a crowd’s attention as I passed right through, absconding with a coin purse or two. 

Perhaps it was intuition, but I always had a clear idea of how things were going to turn out once I put a plan into action. That’s why I headed the thefts – my instincts never led me in the wrong direction. 

That day I’d gone after a snobby noble on Grove 32 who kept referring everyone as “dirty peasants.” I slipped a pouch of cash out of his pocket while he derisively scrutinized the boys and once I was far enough away from the crowd, Minoruba and Antonio came to meet me. We booked it from there, listening to the fading sound of the man squawking about his money and laughing among ourselves.

I kept the money clutched tightly to my chest and skipped around the people who stood scoffing in annoyance at our running around, completely unaware we just stole twenty thousand beri. Darting through and around throngs of people was old news to us, so when we came upon a crowd too large to dodge on Grove 18, we assimilated ourselves and easily kept the speedy pace. Halfway through, I knew that the woman about eight feet in front of me _was going to try and snatch my goods_. I took a sharp left through the crowd, completely avoiding her. The only look I got of her was tan, unnaturally long legs.

Fuck that chick and whatever she may or may not have intended to do.

* * *

I wouldn’t call myself a very distinct kid. Aside from my eyes, there were a lot of other dark skinned, curly headed kids around the archipelago. My untamed baby afro stuck out a good three inches from my head, not unlike some other obviously mixed kids in my age range. I wore basic clothing, muted toned shorts and t-shirts, which were good for escaping people and blending in. Running through crowds as I was wont to do, no normal person could get a good enough look at me to pick me out of a lineup of all the dirty brats on Sabaody.

At eight years old, sitting on a mangrove root by myself and eating a banana, I never expected to hear: 

“You’re the little girl who was running around earlier.”

My immediate response, as always in situations like those, was to make sure the speaker knew they had already fucked up. “I’m a boy, _fuckwad_ ,” I snarled. How can anyone assume a kid’s gender unless they wore ostensibly ‘boy’ or ‘girl’ clothing? The very nature of beings in a prepubescent stage is _androgyny_ ; a little boy in pigtails looks exactly like a little ‘girl’ and a bald little girl looks exactly like a little ‘boy’. They’re both flat chested, forty-two inches tall, and no hormones have kicked in to make their facial structure or any secondary sexual characteristics distinct. That’s the way it’s supposed to be. Sexualizing children is all levels of **wrong**.

“…Hm. Sorry about that.” I hadn’t bothered to look at the woman speaking to me, too intent on finishing my fucking banana. Who had the nerve to (rightly) accuse me of ‘running around earlier’? I swore to god if she was some creepy pedophile then I was going to have Parker personally take care of her. Regardless of the permanent damage his left eighth rib and left tibia sustained back when—

_ his innocence was **stolen** he killed, he was never same, his eyes, his attitude,  _ everything was different _, he was still Parker still so bright but subdued,_ different _, blood on his hands, his small hands, so, so **bloody** , so—_

the _incident_ occurred, his time on the fishing boat had made him almost triple in muscle mass, days filled with hefting up giant nets of live fish. I flicked my eyes over to the woman, making sure to give her _the look_ , resembling a demon child as much as I could. 

And my heart stopped.

I had forgotten that Shakuyaku didn’t seem to age – the jet-black bob that angled up from her jaw to her cheeks looked exactly as it did when I first saw her in the manga, which would be fourteen years in the future. Her crop top seemed the same, too, along with her narrow black eyes and unwrinkled skin. She didn’t look a day over twenty, though I knew she was a fair amount older than that.

I grit my teeth, hoping she didn’t notice the change in my demeanor. That hope was for naught, I knew – by the subtle tilt of her head, by the small quirk of her eyebrows, by the renewed focus. Her intuition was frightening. 

If I remembered correctly, Shakuyaku was well acquainted with either Gol D. Roger or Silvers Rayleigh. She had a fling with Rayleigh? Or was it Roger, who later met Rouge and fell in love? My memories were cloudy from time and I hadn’t bothered to look at that godforsaken notebook in years. 

I took a small breath. “What’s it to ya?” I sneered, wondering if this was it. Would she tell me all the locations that BB used to store our food and show me pictures of them burned to the ground? Would she show me a ledger of all the money I’d stolen in the last two years and force me into a slave payment plan? Would she ask what I was doing here, in a world where I don’t belong?

_ What the fuck does she want? _

“Say, you’re not very normal, are you?” she simpered, knowing the answer before it would’ve left my mouth. I frowned and looked away. “You know,” she continued, taking a step toward me, “I don’t really like the little troublemakers around here. They’re sloppy and always end up tripping over their feet and right into me. I expected you to do the same, you know?” 

I looked back at her, because she was… “In that crowd on Grove 18. You were there.” At that, she grinned, full lips pulling back to reveal a perfectly straight set of teeth. 

“That’s right, young man. So tell me… how long have you been able to use Haki?”

**Author's Note:**

> My beta is a life saver and a very amazing person.


End file.
